Film & TV

Japanese Film Festival Review: Chihayafuru Part 1

A group of friends try to start a competitive Karuta Club in their high school, with dreams of winning the national competition of the traditional card game.

Where would a Japanese Film Festival be without at least one entry based on manga?!

Chihayafuru is a live action comedy/drama based on manga by Yuki Suetsugu and centring around the traditional card game, Karuta.

Karuta is physical and mental challenge based around 100 tanka poems where cards are matched to the opposite half of the poem, read out by a moderator.

Chihayafuru Part 1 is the story of three childhood friends – Chihaya (Suzu Hirose), Taichi (Shûhei Nomura) and Arata (Mackenyu Meada) – who were mad about the game. Now teenagers, Arata has given up the game and lives in the country to help care for his grandfather. Chihaya and Taichi reunite when they enrol in the same high school and attempt to begin a Karuta Club. Taichi has given up the game but agrees to play so he can be close to Chihaya. His romantic interest however, has remained a passionate player and harbours dreams of the club winning the upcoming Tokyo tournament so they can compete in the Nationals.

The young actors are all fine, with Hirose taking on her first cinematic leading role under the steady direction of Norihiro Koizumi. The pace ebbs and flows nicely, with the build up to the competition being surprisingly exciting despite the comedy which abounds through both scripted scenes and some of the quirkier characterisations.

The Tokyo tournament itself, is a mixture of tension and emotion, with pivotal moments of character development occurring throughout the match.

Although billed as the first of two parts, Chihayafuru Part 1 stands alone as a film, with the second part simply being a sequel that continues the kids’ dream to make it to the Nationals.

Both film parts are screening in this year’s Festival, however Chihayafuru Part 2 will only screen once.

Reviewed by Rod Lewis
Twitter: @StrtegicRetweet

Rating out of 10: 8

Chihayafuru Part 1 will screen on 23 and 29 October and Chihayafuru Part 2 will screen on 29 October only, both as part of the 20th Japanese Film Festival, which runs 21-30 October 2016 exclusively at the Mercury Cinema. All films screen with English subtitles.

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