Woman of Water

Because so many masterpieces have been made about people and their mutual relationships, Sugimori Hidenori decided to give the leading role in his feature début Woman of Water to nature; to the confrontation between man and nature and between man and the universe. He wrote the script especially for UA, a kind of Japanese Björk regarded by Sugimori as a reincarnation of the shamans, because whenever anything important happens in UA's life, it rains. In Woman of Water, the same thing happens: when Ryo (UA) loses a tooth, it rains. When her father and her boyfriend die, it pours. Ryo, personification of the element water, inherits a bathhouse and goes to work there with the pyromaniac Yusaku (Asano Tadanobu, known from Distance by KoreEda Hirokazu and Ichi the Killer by Miike Takashi). The wordless confrontations between Ryo and Yusaku, in the bathhouse with its beautiful painted walls, form the greatest attraction of Woman of Water. The fire warms the water. The water puts out the fire. Woman of Water a tapestry full of enchanting details was presented at the Cinemart last year, won the script prize at Sundance, was premièred in Venice (in the Settimana della Critica) and was given a Golden Alexander in Thessaloniki. (Jan Pieter Ekker is editorinchief of Skrien and film critic with the Volkskrant.)