Still the Water

Naomi Kawase’s visually ravishing, beautifully composed film tells the story of two youths growing up and falling in love on a Japanese island.

Naomi Kawase’s visually ravishing, beautifully composed film tells the story of two youths, Kyoto and Kaito, as they grow up and fall in love on a small island off the Japanese mainland.

A film of magnificent natural beauty and philosophical depth, it contrasts its young protagonists burgeoning romance with other relationships – and lives – that are drawing to a close. Kyoto’s mother is a shaman with a terminal illness, seeing out her days in the shade of the family’s 400-year-old banyan tree, while Kaito's parents adjust to the reality of their recent separation. Beautifully composed and deeply moving, Still the Water continues the humanist, family-oriented traditions of classic Japanese cinema in assured, visually intoxicating style.