Come and enjoy the spectacular World of Japanese Cinema at The Japan Foundation, New Delhi.

Theme of the Month is “High School girls, Again – Cool Fun in the Sun”

 

Color / Vista / 2005 / 114 min /Bitters End

Director                 : Yamashita Nobuhiro
Script                    : Mukai Kosuke
                              Miyashita Wakako
                              Yamashita Nobuhiro
Cinematography    : Ikeuchi Yoshihiro
Music                   : James Iha
Producers             : Negishi Hiroyuki
​                              Sadai Yuji

 

Cast:

Song: Bae Doo-na
Yamada Kyoko: Maeda Aid
Tachibana Kei: Kashii Yu
Shirakawa Nozomi: Sekine Shiori
Marumoto Rinko: Mimura Takayo
Teacher Koyama: Komoto Masahiro

Setting: Tokyo in 2004

Synopsis:

This film about youth is set in modern-day high school just outside of Tokyo. In the days just before the school’s culture festival, a girl’s music group is facing a dilemma. They planned on playing an original piece of music but…three days before the festival, the guitarist appears to have broken her finger (actually she doesn’t want to break her nails) and an argument breaks out between the vocalist and Kyoko. They need to find a new guitarist and a new vocalist. While the remaining three girls are pondering who to ask to be the new vocalist, they hear the song, “Linda Linda Linda” by the famous Japanese rock band Blue Hearts and decide they want to sing it instead of an original song.

A Korean exchange student, Song, is sitting in the next room and they take the chance to ask her to be their vocalist. Her Japanese is not perfect, and she’s never sung in front of an audience, but she just happens to be listening to the Blue Hearts song. They practice and practice but they don’t seem to be improving. They spend a lot of time at Kei’s ex-boyfriend’s studio and at the school practicing late into the night. They are really tired, but a deep friendship develops among the four girls.

The night before the festival, they practice late into the night and exhaust themselves. They suddenly wake up the next morning and realize that they are late for the festival. They arrive at the school just as the festival is finishing and perform as the last act. The audience loves them and the four girls play their hearts out.

 

Notes:

Linda Linda Linda was ranked as the 6th best film on the 79th Kinema Junpo best ten list for 2005. Director Yamashita Nobuhiro’s other films, Hazy Life (“Donten Seikatsu,” 2001), No One’s Ark (“Baka no hakobune, 2002) and Ramblers (”Riarizumu no yado,” 2003) also deal with the lives of youths. In Linda Linda Linda, the film uses minimalism and a level-headed approach to convey his ideas to the audience. The Korean character in the film, Song, is played by a Korean actor, Bae Doo-na. She has starred in such Korean films as Park Chan-Wook’s Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance (2002) and Hyeon Nam-Seob’s Saving My Hubby (2002). The actress who plays the role of the bassist, Nozomi, is a real-life musician.