Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy
Gûzen to Sôzô
International Panorama: Japan
Ryusuke Hamaguchi brings a gentle warmth to this ingenious collection of three stories united by themes of fate and mystery.
Gûzen to Sôzô
In the three stories, men and women circle one another as they casually and cruelly share intimacies, express desires and voice doubts.
They talk, revealing themselves as they also tease the story’s themes, fortune and fantasy included. They chat, confess, overshare, open up and lash out. Hamaguchi shows how each situation is redeemed, or at any rate altered, by a kind of miracle.
For example, in the first, Meiko has the magic power to stop and rewind time so that she can play out a certain situation, or conversation, differently.
This trio of stories is elegant and amusing, with a delicacy of touch and real imaginative warmth.