Nani kuwanu kao

The title doesn't lie, because not much happens.

Like Nothing Happened sees Ryusuke Hamaguchi doing his slow-paced, narrative-light thing. While I've liked some of his recent feature films, I've also struggled with his earlier shorts, even though there are clear similarities.

Additionally, the shorts are - obviously - shorter, but I seem to notice and take issue with the slow pace more when things aren't as long. Seems paradoxical, but that's been my experience.

I have to cut Like Nothing Happened some slack for being made when Hamaguchi was so young, and for clearly having modest aspirations as a film. It follows a bunch of ordinary people around and sure, feels like it captures their lives to some extent.

But there's just so little here to grab onto for me. I struggled, but can't entirely hate it, because of its inherent nature and its length (there is apparently a 90-something minute version I was happy to avoid - the version I found was just 43 minutes).