Real

Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s first feature since his 2008 Tokyo Sonata is at once the most romantic and tender work of his career, and entirely consistent with the rest of his unparalleled body of work. It is also, as always, as visually and tonally exquisite as it is unsettling. A star manga artist (Haruka Ayase) is in a coma, the result perhaps of a suicide attempt. In an experimental medical procedure, her husband (Takeru Satô) enters her unconscious in an attempt to awaken her. But when one psyche merges with another, mirror opposites are the possible, troubling result. A haunting successor to the mother of all time travel films, Chris Marker’s La Jetée, with a tip of the hat to Bong Joon-ho’s The Host, Real finds its mysteries in the ordinary. What does it mean to be coupled? Can love conquer death? A unique film from one of the most unique artists in contemporary cinema.