is a 2002 Japanese film directed by

Akihiko Shiota (born 11 September 1961, Maizuru, Kyoto) is a Japanese film director and screenwriter. Career Shiota attended Rikkyo University, where he was in a film club with other students such as Makoto Shinozaki and Shinji Aoyama and began making 8mm fil ...

that released theatrically on 18 January 2003. It features

Tsuyoshi Kusanagi is a Japanese actor, singer, television host, and a former member of SMAP, one of the best-selling boy bands in Asia. Early life Kusanagi grew up in Kasukabe, Saitama, Japan. Career Music In 1987, at age 13, Kusanagi auditioned to enter John ...

(of the pop group

SMAP SMAP was a Japanese boy band, composed of Masahiro Nakai, Takuya Kimura, Goro Inagaki, Tsuyoshi Kusanagi, and Shingo Katori. The group was created in 1988 by music producer Johnny Kitagawa, founder of Johnny & Associates, originally as a six-pi ...

) and

Yūko Takeuchi was a Japanese actress. She is known for her roles in television series ''Asuka'' (1999), ''Pride'' (2004), ''FlashForward'' (2009), and '' Miss Sherlock'' (2018) as well as films such as '' Ring'' (1998), '' Yomigaeri'' (2003), and ''Dog in a ...

in the lead role.

Plot

Set in the city of Aso in

Kumamoto Prefecture is a Prefectures of Japan, prefecture of Japan located on the island of Kyūshū. Kumamoto Prefecture has a population of 1,748,134 () and has a geographic area of . Kumamoto Prefecture borders Fukuoka Prefecture to the north, Ōita Prefecture to ...

, the film begins with scenes of individuals immediately after they have experienced unexplained and mysterious

resurrection Resurrection or anastasis is the concept of coming back to life after death. In a number of religions, a dying-and-rising god is a deity which dies and is resurrected. Reincarnation is a similar process hypothesized by other religions, which ...

. One man and woman are uncovering long untouched musical instruments in a daze, and in one case a young boy finds himself alone in the forest, having suddenly reappeared after vanishing years earlier. Eventually a representative from the Japanese Ministry of Welfare named Heita Kawada (Kusanagi) appears. It is his job to investigate this phenomenon, which begins to be seen not in just the two isolated cases, but in various locations around the city. He discovers on his way to his first meeting with the boy that the child's DNA has been found to match that of a boy who disappeared years earlier (through a match with the umbilical cord saved by the mother), though the child should biologically be now in middle age. This evidence suggests the cases of resurrection occur in such a way that the resurrected person reappears at the same age that he or she supposedly died. Kawada, with his team of investigators, meets and interviews those who are purported to have reappeared after death, some of whom have been dead many years. The investigators also interview the families of the resurrected, who have aged (some significantly) since the death of the person who has now reappeared. In the case of the young boy, his mother has grown into an old woman, in other circumstances a youthful wife has reappeared to rejoin a husband now well into middle age. The movie follows Kawada as he wrestles with the impossibility of the claims, which nevertheless seem to be based on empirically sound evidence. Kawada himself, a native of Aso, also reconnects with his old friend Aoi (Takeuchi), who shares with him a bitter memory of the death of Kawada's friend (and Aoi's lover) Shunsuke (

Yusuke Iseya is a Japanese actor, director, artist, and businessman. Career Iseya co-starred with Arata Iura, Yui Natsukawa, and Susumu Terajima in Hirokazu Koreeda's ''Distance''. He appeared in Takashi Miike's '' 13 Assassins''. He has also appeared in ...

Cast

as Heita Kawada *

as Aoi Tachibana *

Yuriko Ishida is a Japanese actress and essayist from Nagoya. She was the Japanese voice of the title character San from the 1997 animated film ''Princess Mononoke''. She is the older sister of Hikari Ishida, also an actress. Filmography Films *''Gokudo no On ...

as Reiko *

Show Aikawa is a Japanese actor. Career Show Aikawa was born in Tokushima and raised in Kagoshima. Aikawa has appeared in a number of Kiyoshi Kurosawa's films, including ''Eyes of the Spider'', ''Serpent's Path'', ''License to Live'', ''Seance'', and ''Pu ...

as Shuhei * Keiichi Yamamoto as Hideya Nakajima * Yoshikazu Toshin as Yuichi Nakajima *

Hideo Takamatsu was a Japanese actor from Nankoku, Kōchi Prefecture. Takamatsu appeared in more than 120 films between 1948 and 2007. Profile In 1951, he signed his contract with Daiei film company. Two years later, Takamatsu made his film debut with ''Ikare ...

as Haruo Tsuda *

Misaki Ito (born May 26, 1977) is a Japanese actress and model. Her maiden name is . Career In 1999, Ito became the Asahi Beer "image girl" and a model under an exclusive contract to ''CanCam'' magazine. She also appeared in commercials for Gateway comp ...

as Sachiko *

Masami Nagasawa is a common Japanese given name and can be given to either sex. Possible writings *惟美, meaning "Considerate beauty" *真己, meaning "True self" or "Truth, Snake" *昌美, meaning "Prosperous beauty" *雅美, meaning "Gracious beauty" *� ...

as Naomi Morishita *

Shibasaki Kou is a Japanese actress and singer who has performed in television shows, movies, and commercials. She is managed by Stardust Promotion. Biography Acting career Shibasaki debuted in 2000, when she portrayed Mitsuko Souma in '' Battle Royale.'' S ...

a
RUI
* Ichihara Hayato as Yamada * Iseya Yusuke as Shunsuke

References

External links

* {{Use dmy dates, date=June 2011 2002 films Japanese films Films set in Japan 2000s Japanese-language films