Natsuka Kusano

Antonym is a slow-burning drama about human connection, told through the story of two women who come together to write a radio drama. Vain and self-centred Aya is forced to find a writing partner to work on the radio script she is developing. Heavily reluctant to collaborate, she partners shy co-worker Sachiko, who eagerly embraces the project. Peppered with coincidental occurrences and failed relationships, and powered by the friction and growing friendship between the women as they work on the script, Antonym is as much about the inevitability of human connection as it is about the necessity of it.

Aki and Naoko are childhood friends who are drifting apart as adults. Immersed in her family life, Naoko now has a husband and daughter; Aki, on the other hand, remains single and is on leave from work due to a personal crisis. The plot might sound familiar but it has never been told like this. The director Kusano Natsuka stages the interactions through an actors’ table-read and, as the lines are repeated, the scenes gradually develop into on-location conversations. Moreover, she repositions the dramatic peak of the story to the beginning: Aki has murdered Naoko’s daughter.

To the Window with No Signs" by Asahi Mima depicts a woman living with her partner in an apartment in Hiroshima City who meets regularly with a friend by the river to co-write poetry. Performing Hiroshima with Hiroe-san" by Saki Yamada depicts a woman who was exposed to radiation in utero about 1 km from the hypocenter when the atomic bomb was dropped, as herself, her mother, and the narrator of a life, speaking to the camera. Until the End of the Dream" by Natsuka Kusano depicts a woman who has just lost someone important to her as she deals with her "loss" and goes about her daily life. The four short stories "Wherever It May Be" by Mikio Endo follows a theater company's rehearsal of a play about Hiroshima and a young man participating in the rehearsal as a sound staff member, who collects sounds in the outdoors.

An omnibus movie produced to commemorate the 10th anniversary of Motomachi Eigakan.

We’re not far from Hiroshima, where Yoshimi lives alone since the death of her partner. To capture the variations of feelings, the filmmaker focuses sensitively on the young woman’s everyday life and the nondescript, hollowed-out landscapes surrounding her. In a few light strokes, this inner turmoil is portrayed with grace and gentleness. Like so many imaginary offerings, the film reproduces the delicacy of a sip of shared tea, or measures both the weight and the pleasure of a few banal words exchanged over a cake shared across the table.