(also known as ''Nowhere Girl'') is a Japanese

suspense Suspense is a state of anxiety or excitement caused by mysteriousness, uncertainty, doubt, or undecidedness. In a narrative work, suspense is the audience's excited anticipation about the plot or conflict (which may be heightened by a viol ...

thriller film Thriller film, also known as suspense film or suspense thriller, is a broad film genre that evokes excitement and suspense in the audience. The suspense element found in most films' plots is particularly exploited by the filmmaker in this genre. ...

directed by

Mamoru Oshii is a Japanese filmmaker, television director and writer. Famous for his philosophy-oriented storytelling, Oshii has directed a number of acclaimed anime films, including ''Urusei Yatsura 2: Beautiful Dreamer'' (1984), ''Angel's Egg'' (1985), '' ...

. It was released on July 25, 2015, in Japan.

Plot

A strange girl feels that she is out of place in her school. The people around her are also strange. The

Russian military The Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, commonly referred to as the Russian Armed Forces, are the military of Russia. They are organized into three service branches—the Ground Forces, Navy, and Aerospace Forces—two independent comba ...

attacks the school and she kills them with an

AK-74 The AK-74 ( Russian: , tr. ''Avtomat Kalashnikova obraztsa 1974 goda'', lit. 'Kalashnikov assault rifle model 1974') is an assault rifle designed by small arms designer Mikhail Kalashnikov in 1974 as a successor to the AKM. While primarily ...

. She wakes up to find that it was a dream, and the school is actually a

refugee camp A refugee camp is a temporary Human settlement, settlement built to receive refugees and people in refugee-like situations. Refugee camps usually accommodate displaced people who have fled their home country, but camps are also made for in ...

, she is a soldier, and

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

has been invaded by

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

Cast

Nana Seino is a Japanese actress. She has played Sunmi in '' Tokyo Tribe'', Tetsuko Kuroyanagi in the TV Asahi adaptation of Kuroyanagi's autobiography '' Totto-Chan: The Little Girl at the Window'', and Yuko Komiya in the 98th NHK asadora '' Half Blue Sk ...

as Ai *Nobuaki Kaneko *

Lily ''Lilium'' ( ) is a genus of herbaceous flowering plants growing from bulbs, all with large and often prominent flowers. Lilies are a group of flowering plants which are important in culture and literature in much of the world. Most species are ...

* Hirotarō Honda

Reception

The film was panned by audiences, earning 2.43/5 stars on Yahoo Movies Japan and 2.5/5 stars on Eiga.com, with viewers citing the nonsensical story and bad acting as its biggest problems while praising its visuals. ScreenAnarchy stated: "Once again, Oshii Mamoru has made a film which is mostly for himself, treading ground he has covered before in other (and sometimes better) films. But as his reality-addled puzzles go, this one is actually pretty straightforward, and not too hard to solve. Most fans of his work will probably be pleased."

References

External links

* 2015 thriller films 2015 films Films directed by Mamoru Oshii Japanese thriller films 2010s Japanese films {{2010s-thriller-film-stub