COLD FISH

Nobuyuki Shamoto runs a small shop for tropical fish in Shizuoka and keeps out of everything. When his daughter Mitsuko is caught shoplifting, the jovial Yukio Murata steps in – the owner of a far larger aquarium business – and settles the matter. He offers Mitsuko a job, proposes a business partnership to Shamoto, and draws him step by step into his affairs while Shamoto’s wife Taeko falls for the new acquaintance – until Shamoto realises that Murata and his wife do not just cheat their partners, but make them disappear. “Cold Fish” by Sion Sono, Japan 2010, is loosely based on the case of a Japanese serial-killer couple.

Sono tells the descent of a passive man into a vortex of violence with grotesque excesses, over almost two and a half hours; by his own account, he wanted to show a hopelessness he found missing in Japanese cinema. The premiere took place in September 2010 at the Venice Film Festival, after which the film played in Busan and Toronto; at Fantastic Fest in Austin it won the award for best screenplay. The film was shown at Around the World in 14 Films in Berlin in 2011.

Shown at the 2011 edition of Around the World in 14 Films.

All films 2011 · Film Archive