IT’S ONLY TALK (Japan – 2005)
Directed by: Ryuichi Hiroki
Starring: Shinobu Terajima, Etsushi Toyokawa
“I have yet to come across a better film this year, Japanese or otherwise.”
- Tom Mes, Midnight Eye

From the director and star of VIBRATOR (which premiered in a previous NYAFF and was called, “Probably the best Japanese movie of 2003” by Time Out New York) comes this intimate portrait of sex, suburban life and manic depression. Yuko (Shinobu Terajima, VIBRATOR) is a manic depressive thirty something woman drifting through life, supported by the insurance settlement from her parents’ death. In a burst of manic energy, she picks up stakes and moves to Kamada, a depressing little hood on the fringes of Tokyo, and begins to hook up with people she meets in a manic depression chat room, slowly spiraling out of her manic high and into a depressive low. Her cousin, newly separated from his wife, comes to town just in time for her to hit bottom and he has to nurse her back to health. Hardly a slice of grand drama, this poignant, empathetic, and ultimately human film is a small essay about living. Yuko will never “get better”, she’ll always spin from high to low no matter how much medication she’s on, and if one wants to be tough about it then she’s a waste of time. But she’s also a person and for director Ryuichi Hiroki that means she’s entitled to our respect. A movie about how we find meaning in our lives by bumping up against other people, leaning on them, pulling them down, and being lifted up, IT’S ONLY TALK asks for nothing more than an open mind and a heart full of mercy for the scarred and battered animals we call humans. In exchange, it will show you one person’s life in all its lunatic, wounded glory. And that’s worth the world.