The Memory Eraser

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Movie: The Memory Eraser (English title)
Romaji: Kiokuya: Anata wo Wasurenai
Japanese: 記憶屋あなたを忘れない
Director: Yuichiro Hirakawa
Writer: Kyoya Origami (novel), Keiko Kanome, Yuichiro Hirakawa
Producer: Yoshitaka Ishizuka, Masahiro Uchiyama, Asami Nishi, Ryuji Ichiyama
Cinematographer: Takashi Komatsu
Release Date: January 17, 2020
Runtime: 105 min.
Distributor: Shochiku
Language: Japanese
Country: Japan

Plot Synopsis by AsianWiki Staff ©

Ryoichi Yoshimori (Ryosuke Yamada) is a university students. His girlfriend Kyoko Sawada (Misako Renbutsu) is older than him, but he enjoys his time with her. After Ryoichi Yoshimor proposes to his girlfriend, she suddenly disappears one day. Several days later, he finally sees her again. Kyoko Sawada does not have any memory of him. Ryoichi Yoshimori is stunned, but he suspects her memory loss is related to the Kiokuya rumor. A person named Kiokuya is reputed to erase the memories of people. He talks to Chiaki Takaharu (Kuranosuke Sasaki), who is a lawyer and attended the same university, about his situation. Ryoichi Yoshimori searches for the cause of Kyoko Sawada’s memory loss and gets help from childhood friend Maki Kawai (Kyoko Yoshine) and Chiaki Takaharu’s assistant.

Notes

Based on novel "Kiokuya" by Kyoya Origami (first published October 24, 2015 by Kadokawa).
Filming talks place from December, 2018 to January, 2019

Cast

Ryosuke Yamada - Ryoichi Yoshimori
Kyoko Yoshine - Maki Kawai
Misako Renbutsu - Kyoko Sawada
Kuranosuke Sasaki - Chiaki Takaharu
Rika Izumi - Nanami
Atsuko Sakurai - Asako Yoshimori
Naho Toda - Mizuno
Brother Tom - Sotoyama
Tatsuomi Hamada - Sekiyaka
Yuki Saso - Sassa
Risa Sudo - Nozomi Kawai
Tetta Sugimoto - Fukuoka
Sumie Sasaki - Uchida
Min Tanaka - Sugawara
Kurumi Inagaki - Maki Kawai (young)
Jyubun Fukuzawa

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Max Nov 23 2023 11:09 am The story is very intense and very enigmatic, but everything is cleared in the end. I really lilked Yoshino Kyoko's character Kawai Maki...she's very cute.

AB Oct 09 2022 2:08 am This film is so soul-crushing that I almost wish I could forget watching it. But, then I'd watch it "for the first time" again because I'd never avoid watching a film starring Kyoko Yoshine and Ryosuke Yamada (and even Min Tanaka in a small role), and then it would be just as soul-crushing as the first time. So, it's good that "memory erasers" don't really exist.

Kuranosuke Sasaki also is a great actor, and in this film his character pulls the story forward. Yet, he doesn't really take the spotlight much for most of its runtime. The story is allowed to breathe, to push and pull between the characters' different motives for wanting to find the memory eraser. Though the plot is sort of convoluted, it is never confusing. When the twists happen, there are no lingering moments of wondering how the perspective should change.

Rika Izumi looks gorgeous, and though her role is a side character and could easily be played by anybody else (woman or even man), there is no moment of forgetting her character. This is a sign of her performance and the life she breathes into her "mundane" character. Every character has a purpose, and they feel like fleshed out people.

Of course Kyoko Yoshine and Ryosuke Yamada are the real drivers in this film, and both act to the fullest of their emotional expressive capacity. Every time Kyoko Yoshine makes one of her cute signature expressions or gestures, such as the mobile smirk of ambivalent squeeze or the backwards oscillating chin lift with inhalation, my heart fluttered. Maybe some people don't know what I'm talking about, however, these are expressions and gestures she does in almost every role. For me this is one of her primary charm points for why she is one of the top uprising actresses.

In one scene, Ryosuke Yamada screams. My heart felt a deep sense of despair at this part in the film, already because of the plot but doubled by his intense unleashing of harrowing emotion. This scream is one of the most powerful screams of sad anguish I have ever heard in any film. Also, he is one of the most handsome young actors, though, this is irrelevant in regards to his acting ability.

Now I must "spoil" the ending a little (though not much), so please stop reading this comment if you have not watched the film! Because the ending is the final soul-crushing blow. There are two equally possible courses that hang until the very last seconds. Both would be equally sad yet equally happy as well, and this is a genuinely remarkable occurrence demonstrative of true master writing. In both cases it would be ultimately bittersweet, a quality that the Japanese are masters of conveying but, in this case, is even deeper than common. Because of what the ending is, there is a deep sense of "what next?" as if five final minutes are missing. Yet, there could not even be five more seconds or it would diminish the impact.

BoeWings Oct 13 2019 8:21 pm OMG im waiting this ?

N.K Dec 15 2018 12:52 pm Yayyyy.. Yamada's new movie.

The Memory Eraser

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Plot Synopsis by AsianWiki Staff ©

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