The Japan Foundation Touring Film Programme 2025: The Moon

RUN TIME
2 hrs 24 mins

Tuesday 18 March: 1930

In collaboration with The Japan Foundation Touring Film Programme 2025 we are delighted to present four films from this year’s showcase, on the theme of Am I Right? Justice, Justification and Judgement in Japanese CinemaAll tickets only £6, £5 concessions!

DOJIMA Yoko was once a popular novelist, known for a novel about the victims of the 2011 Tohoku earthquake, but has since lost her drive to write. Seeking a change, she begins working at an institution for the disabled hidden within a forest. Not long after meeting the facility’s socially-ostracised residents, Yoko is horrified to witness staff abusing them, but is held together by empathetic young carer SATO.

Soon enough, Yoko discovers that, in spite of her age, she is pregnant. Fearing that the unborn child may be disabled, and having already lost one son, she considers prenatal testing. Meanwhile, SATO begins to exhibit eccentric thoughts on the residents and the value of their lives, which Yoko finds very disturbing...

Directed by ISHII Yuya (The Tokyo Night Sky Is Always the Densest Shade of Blue, JFTFP23), one of the most skilled directors of his generation, The Moon is a chilling adaptation of the novel of the same name, itself based upon a 2016 incident in Japan that saw 19 mentally disabled people murdered in the name of “mercy” by a care home employee. With a furious intensity, ISHII asks scathing questions on the state of the Japanese care system and the meaning of life itself.

Starring MIYAZAWA Rie, ISOMURA Hayato, NIKAIDO Fumi and ODAGIRI Joe.

 

In collaboration with the Japan Foundation

Supported by the Great Britain Sasakawa Foundation

Sponsors in Kind: Athletia, Calbee, Clearspring, Pentel, SUQQU