This Window Is Yours

(KONO MADO WA KIMI NO MONO) ((JAPANESE -- 16MM))

A PIA Corp./Japan Satellite Broadcasting Inc. production. (International sales: PIA Filme Festival Office, Tokyo). Produced by Takenori Sento, Tamotsu Kanamori. Directed, written by Tomoyuki Furumaya.

Its aims may be slight, but it's hard to think of a film that more exactly captures the precise moment adolescents become young adults. First-time feature helmer Tomoyuki Furumaya's wry eye and restrained hand won "This Window Is Yours" the inaugural Dragons & Tigers prize for new Asian cinema at the just-wrapped Vancouver fest.

Pic centers on six youngsters who spend their last summer together in rural northeastern Japan before heading off in separate directions. Soon, the focus rests on a pair who don't quite know they're a pair. Pugnacious Taro (Hideo Sakai) is sidelined with a broken leg, which gives pretty Yoko (Yukako Shimuzo) -- staying just a window away -- plenty of chance to tease Taro back to health and open his eyes to the possibilities of grown-up pleasures.

Although their affections grow steadily, neither is ready for a serious move, making this probably the first teenage-crush tale in which both parties say "I love you" but never get around to kissing each other. Ironically, the sex-free sensuality of this summer romance may be startling to Western auds, but a languorous, hesitant pulse is its chief appeal, along with effortlessly attractive young actors -- non-pros all -- who drift through the happily parentless reverie to the sound of twangy surf guitars.

Helmer claims "American Graffiti" was the pic's chief inspiration, but an episode of Canadian sketchcom "The Kids in the Hall" directed by Ozu comes closer to its gently wacky sensibility.

Tech credits are appropriately rough, with a purposely phony rear-projected fireworks sequence underscoring a no-budget approach to the fleeting joys of youthful confusion. Pic's 16mm format is problematic for theaters, but this "Window" is so universal, it easily could open on any web.

Camera (color, 16mm), Kazuhiro Suzuki; editor, Mari Kishi; music, Isao Yamada; sound, Masami Nishioka; art direction, Toshihiro Isogai. Reviewed at Vancouver Film Festival (in competition), Sept. 23, 1994. Running time: 95 MIN.

With: Yukako Shimuzo, Hideo Sakai, Toshio Kamiaki, Yoshiyuki Kubota, Hirome Kurose, Ayako Noma, Toru Yamaguchi.

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