It’s been just over a month since my first trip to Japan, and I’m still feeling a bit of ‘withdrawal’ from that incredible experience. My husband and I really miss everything about it—the cleanliness, the punctual public transport, the politeness of the locals, and so on. So when I got the opportunity to cover the Japanese drama Memorizu, I couldn’t pass it up.

This is also a great chance to explore a fresh voice in Japanese cinema. Writer/director Miiku Sakanishi recently won the Best New Narrative Director Award at the Tribeca Festival 2026. That’s quite a feat, especially since this is his first feature film, which is a deeply personal and reflective family drama. The plot follows Yuta (Tasuku Emoto), a young dad who makes the journey from Tokyo to a quiet, unnamed rural town on the island of Kyushu to look after his meticulous father-in-law Makoto (Issey Ogata), who is on the mend from a leg injury.

It appears initially that the two don’t have the warmest relationship. Makoto is a well-regarded local photographer known for his high standards. He insists on doing things his way and often keeps a close eye on how Yuta runs his photo studio. Yuta, on the other hand, is a patient guy who does his best to meet Makoto’s exacting standards, but sometimes it feels like he’s underappreciated. When a regular customer casually tells Yuta to look after his father-in-law, Makoto scoffs as soon as she leaves the shop.

Yet over the course of the two months, there are tender moments as they go about their daily duties. The film pays tribute to photography as a way to capture memories, highlighting the daily workings of a traditional photo studio. One of my favorite parts is when Makoto engages with his clients, helping them to feel at ease so they appear more natural and candid in the photos. This is a man who takes great pride in his vocation and views it as a calling to assist the locals in commemorating and preserving the important moments in their lives. I also love the scene where they view a slideshow of Makoto’s old family photos on a projector, featuring his late wife and daughter (Yuta’s wife) as a child.

As Yuta observes Makoto more and more and gets used to the laid-back pace of countryside life during his two-month stay, he begins to notice and document the everyday tasks and snippets of his daily routine. Sakanishi clearly believes that the simple things in life are often the most meaningful. Yuta opening the shop in the morning, Yuta walking the dog, sharing a meal with Makoto (which makes me crave Japanese food even more)… there’s beauty in life’s mundanity. He stays connected with his family, including his wife Yuki (Moeka Hoshi, who I recognize from FX’s Shōgun) and their daughter Hana, through video calls on his smartphone. The opening scene shows how close Yuta is with the curious Hana as they have such an adorable conversation. Meanwhile, Yuki works as a personal tour guide for Chinese tourists and speaks Mandarin fluently. The performances come across as genuine and relatable.

It’s fascinating to see the contrast between the carefully crafted shots from an analog camera and the spontaneous, casual videos shot on an iPhone. Sakanishi doesn’t set one against the other as many do in the digital versus analog debate; instead, he highlights that both have their own unique purposes. Ultimately, they both serve as effective means to capture fleeting moments in time.

I hadn’t seen Emoto prior to this movie, but he has a nice presence on screen and a calming, zen-like aura. The relationships feel grounded in reality and make me think of my own family. Forgoing dramatic, over-the-top emotional moments, Sakanishi subtly shows that Yuta and Makoto gradually come to appreciate and understand one another more. Yuta comes to know Makoto’s close-knit community, who welcome him with open arms, and at one point, they invite Yuta to join them for a karaoke night. In contrast, we see Yuki juggling her job and caring for Hana in Tokyo. She too takes pride in her work and treats her tourist clients as if they were her own family.

These ‘slice of life’ movies often lack dramatic storylines or high-stakes situations, which might prompt some to think that ‘nothing really happens.’ Yet, they invite viewers to pause and embrace the soothing rhythm of daily routines. It also gives us a captivating glimpse into life in the Japanese countryside. The specific location remains vague; instead of pinpointing an exact spot, the town represents a tranquil, everyday rural life in Japan. The grainy cinematography by DP Kamakari Yoichi presents bucolic life in a refreshingly unvarnished, authentic way. 

The muted, organic color palette of earthy tones beautifully conveys the timeless, nostalgic essence of classic photography and country living. Given the topic, it’s no surprise that Memorizu is among the most visually striking films I’ve seen this year. It’s refreshing to see a film with a beautiful, quiet grace like this one in the midst of a hectic blockbuster summer season. It shares DNA with another Japanese drama, Perfect Days (also set in Japan), which also offers poetic, slow-paced reflections of the passage of time and finding quiet joy in nostalgia.

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