ADRIFT IN TOKYO (Satoshi Miki). 101 minutes. Subtitled. Opens Friday (May 1). For venues and times, see Movies. Rating: NNN
An aimless student facing an unpayably huge debt gets a strange offer from a threatening debt collector: walk with the collector in Tokyo until he’s satisfied and he’ll clear the debt.
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The result is a picaresque journey fuelled by themes of love, sex, deception, family, food and death.
Director Satoshi Miki and his cast (Jo Odagiri as the student and Tomokazu Miura as the burly, middle-aged debt collector) have a fine sense of the comedy of daily life and how to tweak it so lightly that the humour emerges while the realism stays intact.
Miki makes Tokyo a pleasure to watch by showing it as a resident might see it: a mix of everyday beauty and standard urban eyesore.
