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Colour is not something you'd usually associate with Hirobumi Watanabe's films. While they are - as the production company name suggests - largely foolish, the black and white gives them a certain trapped, small-town quality and a sad lament on life, perfected in "7 Days" (2015) / "Cry" (2019). While the colour added for his latest work offers the chance to pay homage to Kraftwerk, it also offers a break away from the small-town confines of much of his work, with dreams of Tokyo on the horizon.

The titular Techno Brothers (played by Watanabe and his brother, composer Yuji Watanabe) are a techno outfit playing gigs in small-town venues to audiences of bemused onlookers. Remaining silent throughout, their performances are static as they play away on keyboards. They are perhaps not suited to the locale.

Himuro (Asuna Yanagi), their single-minded manager, is determined to get them to Tokyo to sign a major record contract. But she is far from caring for her talent. Working them hard and feeding them little, they embark on a road trip to Tokyo, gigging along the way, though the band are increasingly rebellious, potentially sabotaging their chances.

Everything about this is wonderfully silly. From the Brothers' expressionless, voiceless faces and permanent Kraftwerk outfit, their performances have everything of the local about them. Playing in venues not designed for their brand of music, the audiences sit in silence, moving even less than the musicians themselves. Inexplicably, they bring in money, which Himuro pockets for herself, eating her fill, while the Brothers watch on with a glass of tap water each.

With their silence, sunglasses and facial hair, the Brothers come across as perfect pets, doing as they are told. But like all animals, they eventually get up to mischief, though their efforts to escape are as meek as their will against their manager.

The live performances of full-length tracks are absurd, but the sheer stillness against the thumping techno make for comedic joy, leaving you to fill in your own blanks as to what the audience are thinking. While there are a lot of them, they never feel unwelcome, in what is a fairly basic storyline.

As with other Watanabe films, the camera is often at a distance and sits still as the actors deliver their lines. Though with many scenes outdoors, the voices are often competing with background noise. While this may feel a little amateurish, it adds to the road trip feel, finding yourself in any and every location.

Part of you wants this to be in black and white, as is Watanabe's style, with this more an outright comedy than the more sensitive and isolated edge of his other films, and so maybe falls a little short of some of his other works.

But this is fun that doesn't take itself too seriously; Hirobumi Watanabe taking on several roles, including his trademark appearances in a Japan football shirt. Yuji Watanabe's soundtrack also delivers, with the performances amusing, but the music itself not comical. And the more you see children and the elderly sit stoney-faced, the more you want to smile.

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The JFF - Japanese Film Festival offers the possibility of viewing the fantastic TECHNO BROTHERS for free: a tribute to Kaurismaki's cinema and above all to Kraftwerk's style and music, all through the personal vision of Hirobumi Watanabe and his brother (who composed the soundtrack). A feeling of profound melancholy pervades the film's irresistible humor, delivering it to a dimension of nostalgic surrealism. The stillness of the images has a classic flavor, the long and very long shots are reminiscent of Shimizu Hiroshi. There is also a touch of Sartre and of course Beckett. TECHNO BROTHERS is happy, sad, profound, stylized. Maybe this movie is not for everybody, but I truly loved it.