Tremble All You Want (2017) #
Plot and review. #
First love - to an extent we have all expereinced this at varying degrees of success. Like a powerfull drug, many of us (incl. me) are guilty of chasing this imaginary dragon throughout our adulthood.
Film portraits Yoshika Eto, 24 y.o. accountant, as she obsesses over her middle school love Ichi, whom she fantacized as Natural Born Prince. An obsession she constantly informs the cast of characters giving screenplay anime’ish (cartoonish) vibes millenials will surely admit. At the very same time she is thwarting advances of her colleague Ni (’two’ in japanese, making him and Ichi ’two’ and ‘one’ respectively). Call for (classmate) reunion nourishes her dream even further. Here, we witness that she lives in a realm of fantasy.
Mayu Matsuoka (actress) manages to project social awkwardness with brilliance, although she is built as one (or two, if we count her fascination with extinct animals) dimensional character.
In the movie’s second act, upon learning how invisible she is to Ichi, and thereby leaving this pursuit altogether, her well-being becomes solely reliant on (creepy and forced) attention she receives from her (ex) colleague Ni (real name Kirishima).
Verdict. #
Sadly, neither Yoshika’s class act, nor her deteriorating mental state, are not enough to save this film from “becoming a pointless execise in generic rehashing”.
Memorable moments. #
References. #
Blood Brothers [Jamie Cansdale]
Cinema Slasher [Blair Hoyle]
easternKicks.com [Pieter-Jan Van Haecke]
easternKicks.com [Prince Lee]
EFilmCritic [Jay Seaver]
EyeForFilm.co.uk [Jennie Kermode]
Film Carnage [Rebecca Cherry]
FilmDoo [David Pountain]
JumpCut Online [Elena Morgan]
kalafudra.com [Lena Lisa Vogelmann]
No es cine todo lo que reluce [Daniel Farriol] (Spanish)
Quinlan.it [Giampiero Raganelli] (Italian)
Sonatine: Appunti sul cinema giapponese [Valerio Costanzia] (Italian)
The Japan Times [Mark Schilling]
VCinema [Alessandra Bautze]
Webs of Significance [YTSL]
Windows on Worlds [Hayley Scanlon]