Umbrella Flower (2000) User Reviews

Bleak and challenging but ultimately uplifting

[nmegahey · 8/10 · 28 February 2008]

Waking up in a public park with no trousers on and an unknown woman lying with her head in your lap isn't the best way to start a relationship, even less so when Renji Sawaki (Tadanobu Asano), a junior government minister, discovers that the woman Yuriko (Kyokon Koizumi) is the hostess at a "pink club", and that he has agreed a suicide pact with her. In the sober cold light of day Sawaki thinks better of it, but as his personal life and career are in bad shape, he decides it might be an opportune moment to get away from things and takes up Yuriko's offer to travel to the remote island of Hokkaido, where she hopes to be reunited with a daughter she left behind as a baby five years previously.

The reasons for this unlikely alliance aren't immediately clear and Somai's complicated, challenging structure doesn't help. Two threads, occasionally interweaving, move backwards in time in a disorienting manner, tracing the events that have brought both characters together in despair. The main road-movie thread of Yuriko and Sawaki travelling to Yuriko's hometown in Hokkaido is also a difficult journey – with two very different personalities, each with their own problems and unable to find any solace in each other's company, the journey isn't exactly a forward looking one either. The outlook in Kaza-hana may be constantly bleak, but the emotional pay-off makes it worthwhile, and the performance of the two leads is outstanding.

Sincere and warm piece of work from veteran Director Somai Shinji

[ml-17 · 8/10 · 2 June 2001]

A beautiful story on the age-old theme of love and hope, set against a background of two contrasting Japans, city Tokyo and countryside Hokkaido.

The ending while predictable, is movingly conveyed by its leading actors with much warmth, sincerity and truth of the moment. Koizumi Kyoko shines in her first film role and Asano Tadanobu is perfect as the down-and-out Sawaki Kenji who finds his salvation in the struggling Yuriko.

Constructed for our dreams

[ReadingFilm · 8/10 · 30 November 2022]

I notice much of his work is in how people look. It always balloons from there with our assumptions about them. Here he is a bureacrat in a suit but also mildly drunk the whole time, more of an anti-yuppie. She a stripper with a heart of gold.

I believe his character is meant to display a casual and banal cruelty. The son of privilege and means, but is a generational black hole.

It flips the expectation. Throughout it we think he is damaged beyond repair rather than the self-indulgent narcissist that he is. We also underestimate her real pain, thinking she is there to fix him.

Much of it only sets in after, it is like it was being constructed for our memories. Overall, Somai's final film has a quiet majesty to it.

Slow, but heartrending.

[Meganeguard · 9/10 · 23 March 2005]

Some movies are bittersweet before one even watches them. After finding the DVD of _Kaza-Hana_ in my school's library, I did a quick search for it on the IMDb, and learned that the director, Soomai passed away from lung cancer the year after this film was released. It is fitting in a way, because this movie centers on death and life after the death of a loved one.

Sawaki Renji, Asano Tadanobu, seems to have it all: he is a bureaucrat for the ministry of education in which he quickly climbing the career ladder and he also has a pretty twenty year old girlfriend. However, everything is not roses for Sawaki. Every night he gets completely sloshed and he seems to be impotent as well. One night, while drunk of course, Sawaki enters a convenience store and steals what appear to be a candy bar and a can of beer. He is caught and soon his picture is plastered in the papers. His boss tells him to lay low, and hopefully the media will soon lose interest. Instead of studying his law books, Sawaki seems determined to drink himself into oblivion. One night Renji Sawaki meets his kindred spirit: Yuriko, Koizumi Kyoko, _Blue Spring_, _Milo and Otis_ (hehe).

Unlike Renji, Yuriko's life is going nowhere fast. She is nearing her mid-thirties and works as a "professional hostess" in a bar and does more than just serve drinks. She is originally from Hokkaido and wants to return there to see her family. A Drunken Kenji agrees to travel with her into the mountains to see the last snow of the season, but not for aesthetic purposes. It seems that one of the most peaceful ways to commit suicide is to take sleeping pills and fall asleep in the snow.

As usual Asano does a stellar job of acting in this film. As sober Sawaki he is dead serious and has about as much sense of humor as a piece of wood, but when he is drunk he tends to become quite humorous. Koizumi's character is adorable and her chemistry with Asano is stunning. Near the end of the film, there is one scene that will definitely make one choke up.

Japanese version of "Leaving Las Vegas"

[dfs-2 · 28 October 2004]

...but with a happy ending.

About a drunk loser engages the services of a pink bar girl (sort of an escort). Then go on a road trip to the countryside of Hokaiddo. Sounds familiar? ....sounds like Leaving Las Vegas to me.

Except the ending is not quite as dark.

The film is peppered with flashbacks. Flashbacks of the drunk loser are on how they met, but the pink bar girl's flashbacks go further back on her previous life when she was happily married up to the point of tragedy.

Very touching movie with sad memory and unpredictable life

[u8936044 · 9/10 · 16 November 2021]

A guy who has a decent job , get drunk and do something stupid recently , will get fired soon.

A woman who has an erotic job , has a sad memory in her past . Her dad and her husband lost life accidentally , she think she has a stable life but now she need leave her daughter and do old job again.

Both of them wanna to go some place far away , like Hokkaido , and maybe die there peacefully.

They drive , they drunk and see snow on top of mountain.

But maybe they have other opportunity , maybe chance is next to you , stay up with each other and new life in new place. Right? Never give up!!!

Very touching movie with great act and actress , director Shinji Somai get lot improve with great tempo and more reasonable long shot , two major character speak funny and make you wanna know more about their past. Score and landscape is great too.

Slow-Moving "Road" Movie

[Matt73 · 5/10 · 10 May 2001]

One thing for sure, this movie is too slow-moving! I mean, there she was walking up the stairs. I closed my eyes out of boredom and fell asleep, and there she was, still walking up the stairs!

The idea is good, but the final outcome is not. The scene where the female character falls into dreaming state is too long and does not convey anything.

Rating: 5 out of 10