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Movies / On DVD / Bright Future
Bright Future

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Bright Future (2004)

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Reviews Counted:20

Fresh:14

Rotten:6

Average Rating:6.6/10

Rated: Not Rated

Runtime: 1 hr 55 mins

Genre: Foreign Films

Theatrical Release:Nov 12, 2004 Limited

Synopsis: Tadanobu Asano and Joe Odagiri star as two friends who work part-time in a laundry factory in Kiyoshi Kurosawa's highly original BRIGHT FUTURE. Odagiri is Yuji Nimura, a messy, lazy slacker who has... Tadanobu Asano and Joe Odagiri star as two friends who work part-time in a laundry factory in Kiyoshi Kurosawa's highly original BRIGHT FUTURE. Odagiri is Yuji Nimura, a messy, lazy slacker who has odd dreams at night of a future of hope and peace. His best friend, Mamoru Arita (Asano), meanwhile, is obsessed with his pet red jellyfish, a poisonous creature he is training to be able to survive in fresh water. After mysteriously presenting the marine invertebrate to Yuji, he even more mysteriously viciously murders his boss and willingly accepts his fate. While Mamoru is in prison, Yuji grows attached to the jellyfish and to his friend's estranged father, who repairs old televisions, radios, and lamps in his own cluttered shop. The very busy Asano (ICHI THE KILLER, THE BLIND SWORDSMAN: ZATOICHI, LAST LIFE IN THE UNIVERSE) and Odagiri are excellent in the lead roles, filled with a quiet ennui and disassociation from the rest of the world. Longtime actor Tatsuya Fuji provides outstanding support as Mr. Arita, who becomes a kind of surrogate father to Yuji. Kurosawa, the director of such successful thrillers as DOPPELGANGER, PULSE, and CURE, here alternates between beautifully shot scenes and grainy set pieces, steady camerawork and handheld moments, keeping the audience perpetually off balance yet mesmerized. BRIGHT FUTURE, which was nominated for the Palme d'Or at Cannes, is a slow-paced, introspective, intelligent film that has a dark underbelly lurking just beneath it, like the potential lethal bite of a jellyfish. [More]

Starring: Jô Odagiri, Tadanobu Asano, Tatsuya Fuji, Takashi Sasano

Starring: Jô Odagiri, Tadanobu Asano, Tatsuya Fuji, Takashi Sasano, Marumi Shiraishi

Director: Kiyoshi Kurosawa

Director: Kiyoshi Kurosawa
Screenwriter: Kiyoshi Kurosawa
Composer: Pacific 231
Studio: Palm Pictures

[See More Credits]

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Release:

Mar 8, 2005

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Reviews for Bright Future

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1 - 20 (sorted by date)
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Kurosawa's weird look at the empty lives of modern youth is mysteriously eye-catching but nothing deeper.

Full Review Source: Ozus' World Movie Reviews | comment Comment
09/17/09
Dennis Schwartz
Dennis Schwartz
Ozus' World Movie Reviews

no less enigmatic, broad-reaching and majestically paced than a jellyfish.

Full Review Source: Eye for Film | comment Comment
11/21/07
Anton Bitel
Anton Bitel
Eye for Film
N/R

Click to read the article

Full Review Source: Combustible Celluloid | comment Comment
05/26/06
Jeffrey M. Anderson
Jeffrey M. Anderson
Combustible Celluloid
N/R

Click to read the article

Full Review Source: AV Club | comment Comment
09/26/05
AV Club

a genre that's starting to get overplayed

Full Review Source: Filmcritic.com | comment Comment
03/08/05
Christopher Null
Christopher Null
Filmcritic.com

Gradually establishes a sense of foreboding that is hard to shake, though it's not without its darkly humorous moments.

Full Review Source: Seattle Times | comment Comment
01/28/05
John Hartl
John Hartl
Seattle Times

Kurosawa's mysterious film about Japan's disaffected and alienated youth.

Full Review Source: Seattle Post-Intelligencer | comment Comment
01/27/05
Bill White
Bill White
Seattle Post-Intelligencer

No stranger to the bizarro social metaphor, [Kurosawa] somehow paints the film's title as honestly optimistic, winkingly ironic, and completely doom-laden at the same time.

Full Review Source: The Stranger (Seattle, WA) | comment Comment
01/27/05
Andrew Wright
Andrew Wright
The Stranger (Seattle, WA)
N/R

Click to read the article

Full Review Source: Boston Phoenix | comment Comment
01/15/05
Boston Phoenix

The movie has a curious and cumulative power.

Full Review Source: Boston Globe | comment Comment
01/14/05
Ty Burr
Ty Burr
Boston Globe
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

It's a haunting, spooky journey into a world that embraces trippy ambiguity.

Full Review Source: E! Online | comment Comment
12/10/04
E! Online

The most spellbinding aspect of Bright Future is that the surrealism sustains its own squiddish logic, concluding with one of the most breathtaking film finales of the year.

Full Review Source: Entertainment Weekly | comment Comment
11/17/04
Lisa Schwarzbaum
Lisa Schwarzbaum
Entertainment Weekly
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

More high -- but strangely touching -- weirdness from acclaimed Japanese auteur Kiyoshi Kurosawa.

Full Review Source: TV Guide's Movie Guide | comment Comment
11/12/04
Ken Fox
Ken Fox
TV Guide's Movie Guide

Pretty to look at, but it's a slow-moving, meandering work that isn't as complex or mysterious as it appears.

Full Review Source: New York Daily News | comment Comment
11/12/04
Robert Dominguez
Robert Dominguez
New York Daily News
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

...an enchantingly cryptic, ethereally photographed slice of somber surrealism that should definitely appeal to fans of David Lynch and Luis Buñuel.

Full Review Source: Premiere Magazine | comment Comment
11/12/04
Aaron Hillis
Aaron Hillis
Premiere Magazine

Directed by Kiyoshi Kurosawa, a prolific and sui generis talent from Japan, this quietly creepy film contains a hint of politics and a wealth of shivers.

Full Review Source: New York Times | comment Comment
11/11/04
Manohla Dargis
Manohla Dargis
New York Times
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

The writer-director's story sense is far too distracted, clouding the film's themes and even its basic plotline and allowing only the most glancing insights into its characters.

Full Review Source: Variety | comment Comment
11/11/04
David Rooney
David Rooney
Variety
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

Bright Future can be off-putting -- neither of the two protagonists attempt to engage the camera, and more woe is expended on mourning Mamoru than considering his victims.

Full Review Source: Village Voice | comment Comment
11/09/04
Michael Atkinson
Michael Atkinson
Village Voice
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

That the film succeeds on the level of a thriller as well as of a philosophical reflection is a proof of Kurosawa as perhaps the best Japanese filmmaker of his generation.

Full Review Source: Not Coming to a Theater Near You | comment Comment
10/27/04
Matt Bailey
Matt Bailey
Not Coming to a Theater Near You

Though admirers of the director's eerie, elegant horror tales Pulse and Cure will find Bright Future rather more lugubrious, Kurosawa's latest turns out to have a surprising emotional pull and a truly transcendent final shot.

Full Review Source: eye WEEKLY | comment Comment
01/31/04
Jason Anderson
Jason Anderson
eye WEEKLY
 
 
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