Hirokazu Koreeda

A warm, lovingly crafted drama, with a spectacular central performance and fine cinematography, leaning quite heavily on its fantastical premise while using it to question more prominent issues.

After Life is about enjoying and appreciating the good things you have. Warmly recommended for everyone who doesn't mind the modest pacing and styling.

It's a welcoming, soothing and comforting drama that's just all too rare in cinema. Hopefully Koreeda continues this upward trend, I'm already looking forward to his next film.

Koreeda's first feature film is quite the calling card. A superb example of subtle and subdued Japanese drama, that handles its themes and characters with the proper respect, never once displaying the need to torture them unnecessarily in the name of sentiment. The strict cinematography, the haunting score, and the lovely performances all add to the emotional core of the film, the finale is more than the cherry on the cake. It's a rather slow and challenging film, but the payoff is tremendous.

The characters are given ample room to thrive, the underlying drama is solid and the film features a stellar concept that intrigues even beyond the scope of its running time.

Decent Koreeda, though not quite justifying all the hype surrounding it. Koreeda is great at documenting everyday life, but I prefer it when his film are quieter and more introverted. Still, some great performances, fine camera work and a strong focus on the drama make this a worthy film. Just not exceptional.

One of Koreeda's earlier feature length dramas, though by then he already had a few big arthouse hits under his belt. Distance never made it that big, maybe it is the somewhat more particular and elaborate setup that got in the way of the actual drama. Still, Koreeda fans will find a very nice film here.

Koreeda doing a murder mystery/prison drama. While the quality present is obvious, Koreeda's style doesn't really blend well with the genre. The film is a little too narrative-driven and it gets a bit boring whenever things need to move forward. Not bad, but Koreeda can do much better.

Decent anthology, sadly without stand-out entries. Kaidan stories aren't very scary or gory, so don't expect any modern horror action. Tsukamoto and Koreeda deliver the best entries, Lee's one is decent, the only subpar short is coming from Ochiai. Ironically, the only true horror director present.

Koreeda's first stand-alone project. It's a short doc on a class that takes care of a calf and has its entire curriculum based on that experience. It's a disarming doc that shows kids can handle mature issues if handled properly. Koreeda's "show, don't tell" approach is already on display here, production values are low though.

I tend to like Koreeda's feature films, his documentaries are a lot tougher to stomach. It's a bit surprising because Koreeda's best films are the ones where he draws very natural performances from his cast, even so his documentaries tend to feel somewhat forced and poorly constructed.