Super Happy Forever

Kohei Igarashi's 2024 Japanese film is built in two halves. In the first, Sano returns with his friend Miyata to a seaside town in Izu; he is difficult, impatient and angry, says he is looking for something at the hotel and does not explain what. The second half goes back five years and shows him meeting his wife Nagi in the same town. The film hands the viewer its information late, and the reason for the behaviour in the first half becomes clear only in the second. It never uses the word grief, building the loss indirectly through a red hat and a hotel room. The pace is slow, the scenes long, and humour appears in unexpected places. It opened a sidebar at Venice. Who it's for: viewers who like slow Japanese drama and games with structure. Who it's not for: anyone waiting for explanation; the film keeps you in the dark through its first half on purpose.