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Ryo Katayama seems to have a particular motif for his 2023 works, since, after “Unknown”, that realistically explores the lives of bit actors in the Japanese movie industry, “Meandering” focuses on the lives of painters and the struggles they face in order to become known and make a living out of their art.

“Meandering” review is part of the Submit Your Film Initiative

Michio is such a man, who, despite wishing to become a painter, he instead works collecting big trash along Muto, his senior and his only friend. Michio has essentially left his art behind but Muto's insistence for him to continue to pursue it and to finally get a girlfriend, eventually pay off when he pushes him to both exhibit his paintings in a café and to start talking to Sachi, a girl they meet by chance during their work. Sachi is soon proved to be more than just a love interest,...

Hong Kong distributor Kam & Ronson will be releasing Makoto Tanaka‘s Sing, Salmon, Sing! (Utatama) on region 3 DVD with English subtitles on June 22nd. When the film was released in 2008, it was billed as the next big uplifting teen comedy in the same vein as Waterboys, Swing Girls, and Hula Girls. Nikkatsu tried to sell it at the American Film Market later that year, but it was never picked up for distribution in the west.

Plot: Kasumi (Kaho) is a soprano in the Nanahama High School chorus and loves nothing more than to sing. When the popular student council president Makimura (Hideo Ishiguro) asks to photograph her, she couldn’t be more excited, but for some reason he seems to only want a shot of her while she’s singing. After her next performance, he shows her the photograph he took and jokingly informs her that her face resembles a spawning salmon whenever she sings.