I Wish

Siblings try to find a way out of the circumstances imposed on them by their parents. Their lives are turned upside down when their parents divorce and custody arrangements split them up. Twelve-year-old Koichi ends up with his mother Nozomi, and they move in with her parents in a small village where she gets a job at a supermarket. Koichi's younger brother Ryunosuke, meanwhile, moves in with his dad Kenji, a struggling musician who can't hold on to a day job. The brothers miss each other and want to bring their parents back together, and when they hear of an urban legend that if two people make the same wish at the same time while watching two bullet trains pass one another, the wish will immediately come true, they decide this is the way to reunite the family.

It has its funny moments and it reminds you of your childhood (if you are more that 25 years old haha). The concept idea is a good one and the performance its quite good too. I was expecting way more to say the true, but everyone has its own tastes. Worth watching? 1 time, yes.

As a result of their parent's separation, 12-year-old Koichi (Koki Maeda) lives in Kagoshima with his mother (Nene Ohtsuka) and grandparents (Kirin Kiki and Isao Hashizume) while his younger brother Ryunosuke (Oshiro Maeda) lives with his intermittently employed musician father (Jo Adigiri) in Fukuoka. Both talk to each other daily on their cell phone but have not seen each other in six months. Acclaimed Japanese director Hirokazu Koreeda's I Wish is a comedy/drama about the consequences of a split family and of the children's longing to reunite them. In contrast to Nobody Knows, an earlier Koreeda film about children, I Wish will not break your heart.

The brothers (brothers in real life as well) are very different in personality but both seem happy and well adjusted in spite of the difficult circumstances of their life. Ryu is fun loving and his toothless smile will warm your heart. Koichi is more serious and thoughtful but very engaging. He becomes elated when he hears that a bullet train is coming that will connect his city to his brother's. Even more exciting are the rumors that are floating around that when two trains pass each other in opposite directions, your wishes will come true out of the energy the trains create. Koichi's wish is for the nearby volcano to explode so that his family will have to move, and he will be reunited with his brother.

The plan is to meet his brother half-way and do some serious wishing. The fun starts when they have to find creative ways to raise the money. There's also the pesky part about Koichi and his two friends leaving school in the middle of the day. For this he recruits his grandfather to provide an excuse to the school authorities and includes the school librarian who once had a similar experience of wanting to escape from school to attend a concert.

The group of friends of both brothers adds a lot to the film as well. Tasuku (Ryoga Hayashi) wants to marry his teacher, a bit of magic realism there. Makoto (Seinosuke Nagayoshi) wants his dog to come back to life. Megumi (Kyara Uchida), much to her mother's indifference, wants very much to go to Tokyo and become an actress. Kanna (Kanna Hashimoto) wants to be a better painter, and Rento (Rento Isobe) wants to be a faster runner. While the focus of the film are the wishes of the group of children and their trip to the trains' midpoint, the film also provides a rounded portrait of all of its characters without syrup or other sweeteners, though it certainly views children through a somewhat rose-colored lens.

I Wish is a charming and lighthearted film, though its over two hour's length can makes the goings-on a bit tedious. Although the children arrive at the point of realizing that accepting what is can produce happiness, the growth in reaching that point is what the film is about. Ultimately, however, though hoping, wishing, and yearning are all part of childhood, some adults come to realize that, a step beyond wishing and hoping and praying for something to happen, is our ability to create, to make things happen. Unfortunately, most people have not gotten past the hoping stage.

If, as many have pointed out, Koreeda is Ozu's cinematic heir, then I Wish is Koreeda's take on Ozu's Good Morning. Both films focus on adorable young kids and Japanese family life, and I have no qualms about saying between the two films, Koreeda easily outdoes Ozu. Not only is Koreeda's depiction of children subtler and more intuitive (no fart jokes here), but he coaxes wonderfully naturalistic performances from his child actors. Is there a director alive who does better work with kids than Koreeda? The movie really takes flight once the kids hit the road on their quest, and I loved the Ozu-ish part where they meet an elderly couple that takes in all the children for a night. Just a wonderful movie with tons of heart. Puts the human in humanistic filmmaking.

Kouichi (Kouki Maeda) and Ryunosuke (Oushiro Maeda) who's parents are separated and now lives apart in Fukuoka, and Kagoshima hears about a rumor that if you see the meeting of the first bullet trains from Fukuoka and Kagoshima, a miracle will happen. Wishing that the miracle will be the reunion of their parents, they set out to see the meeting of the two trains, while involving their friends, teachers, and adults around them.

Child prodigy stand up comic team Maeda-Maeda performs the role of Kouichi, and Ryunosuke. Director Hirokazu Koreeda originally had a different plot for the story, where a girl living in Fukuoka, goes to see the two trains crossing each other on the track, meets a boy from Hakata and love story ensues. But upon seeing Maeda-Maeda at the audition, he changed the story to that which involves the two brothers. The project was a promotional campaign for the opening of the Kagoshima route of Japan Railways bullet train line. They brought the project to director Koreeda, and he accepted.

Very common story that involves nothing but the life of few children, but is made extraordinary by the direction of Koreeda, and the performance of Maeda brothers. Observation of people in common life, and attention to detail is extraordinary, and can only come from the eyes of a genius. I can see why Koreeda is regarded so highly as a director. I'd say only few directors can take a theme like this, and create a truly intriguing movie like this one.

In reality it is virtually impossible to pinpoint where the two trains will meet on the track, so the story is purely fictional.

It may be difficult to see all the inner workings of this movie at a first glance, but it is worth the time to sit in and really enjoy the performance.

Two young brothers, Kouichi and Ryuunosuke live apart in Fukuoka and Kagosima because of there parent's divorce. One day they know about a rumour that the person who sees the two new bullet trains passing each other for the first time gains his dream, and they plans to see it to make their wish to live together with their family again. With few friends of them, they goes to their meeting point. This film is very nice. We can see two brother's strong wish and their grow up in their spirits through the trip clearly. However, if I could say one thing, I want to see more about their past, or their life with their parent after they live apart. I could see their desire to live with their family again, but I could not see much trouble or conflict. However other than this, I think this film is very good and moving film.