Poignant and sweet, this story of a 12 year old Japanese boy, living with his mother and grandparents, who yearns for his father and 10 year old brother who live elsewhere and plans to bring them back by wishing on a train is terrific. Real-life brothers Koki and Ohshirô Maeda, who also work as comedians at their tender ages, are delightful as the star Koichi and playful Ryu. The movie wasn't on our radar screen but we saw it was playing nearby and caught most of it a couple of days before leaving for our beach vacation 2 weeks ago. I say "most of it" because, maddeningly, not only did the theatre not warn us there would be no trailers, but when we walked into the 2:20 screening at 2:19 the movie was in progress and we didn't see at least two scenes that were in the trailer. I have ranted and been promised it won't happen again.
Now I'm reminded that I have seen and loved two other pictures by director/writer/editor Hirokazu Koreeda (AKA Kore-eda) and wrote about him and them in Still Walking (it and Nobody Knows (2004) are now available to watch instantly on Netflix. Do it!). Koreeda has said his inspiration for the story was a new Japanese bullet train that opened last year and that the English translation of the actual Japanese title Kiseki is "miracle."
The DVD release date hasn't yet been set and, in fact, the movie is still moving slowly around this country (here are some upcoming dates). If you can see it anywhere, do so, and save it to your netflix queue to savor when it's finally available. You don't have to take my word for it--on rottentomatoes the audience average is 84% and critics vote 92%.
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