This film was released 15th April 2016, and is no longer screening.

★★★★★ RTÉ.ie

After learning of the death of their long-estranged father, grown-up sisters Sachi (Haruka Ayase), Yoshino (Masami Nagasawa) and Chika (Kaho) travel to attend his funeral where, for the first time, they meet their younger half-sister Suzu (Suzu Hirose), a ruminative, soft- spoken teenager. Recognising that her stepmother is not a steadfast guardian, Sachi impulsively invites Suzu to come to Kamakura, the seaside city where the sisters live in their late grandmother’s idyllic, secluded home.

Suzu effortlessly settles in, forming bonds with her three older siblings whose growing fondness for her is nevertheless complicated by the fact that her mere presence reminds them, to varying degrees, of a turbulent past. Koreeda (Like Father, Like Son, I Wish) allows much of this turmoil to play out just beneath the surface however, preferring instead to draw us in with understated, often bucolic scenes in which the relationships between these characters gently and ineffably unfold. (Notes by Alice Butler.)

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