Join us at Japan House London for a screening of Our Little Sister (2015), the last installment of this season of film screenings exploring Koreeda Hirozaku’s portraits of contemporary Japanese lives.

Loosely adapted from the manga series Umimachi Diary (lit. ‘diary of a seaside town’) by Yoshida Akimi, this heartfelt and delicate story follows the lives of three sisters Sashi, Yoshino and Chika in the coastal Kamakura. Living together in their grandmother’s house after their parent’s divorce the sisters decide to welcome their newly-discovered young half-sister Suzu after the death of their estranged father.

Family is once again at the core of Koreeda’s focus, its ties narrated through the empty space left by characters who are outside the screen, from the girls' grandmother to their distant and deceased parents with themes such as grief, guilt and heartbreak rendered with a subtle and light touch.

The intimacy of small moments such as meals and the serene, bucolic surrounding of the Japanese landscape are both a backdrop for the tender and bittersweet sibling dynamics and a testament of resilience, as Koreeda delves deeper into the ambiguous, sometimes makeshift nature of family relationships.

The screenings are in Japanese with English subtitles.

Duration: approx. 127 mins

Guests who are booked to attend the screening can also enjoy 10% off drinks at The Stand on their way in.