TOKYO KOEN

She who is the ex-girlfriend
of his best friend.
She who is the step sister of him.
TOKYO KOEN
2011 / 119min / Color / 35mm
Haruma Miura
("Koizora", "Kimi ni Todoke")
Nana Eikura
("April Bride", "My Sister, My Love")
Manami Konishi
("Nonchan Noriben", "The Angel’s Egg")
Haruka Igawa
("Tokyo Sonata", "Dear Doctor")
Directed by
Shinji Aoyama ("Eureka", "Sad Vacation")
Screenplay
Masaaki Uchida, Norihiko Goda, Shinji Aoyama
Music
Isao Yamada, Shinji Aoyama
Based on the original novel
"Tokyo Koen"
by Yukiya Shoji / Shinchosha Co.,Ltd
And she who reminds him of
someone from the past.
Be happy once again
Tender and yet compelling
Love story
With fresh sensitivity
“Tail her and take pictures of her” - it all started with an unexpected request
Koji (Haruma Miura), a college student and an
whom he spent a lot of time together. He can talk
aspiring photographer, takes photographs of
to her about anything. Misaki (Manami Konishi)
families at a park in Tokyo partly because he lost
is a step sister through their parents’ remarriage.
his mother when he was young. One day, out of the
She is always there for him to give gentle and yet
blue, he receives a request to follow a client’s
firm support. And there is another woman
girlfriend and take pictures of her. He takes on the
(Haruka Igawa) who stands on the other side of
job without fully understanding the circumstances,
his camera lens. She reminds him of someone
and the job leads to changes in himself and his
from a distant memory. As Koji looks straight at
relationships with women around him.
these three women, something starts to change
Miyu (Nana Eikura) is a childhood friend with
inside him too.
SHINJI AOYAMA’s stylish ways have over the years
gripped at the hearts of the audiences around the world
– and now here is a story about love.
© 2011 Tokyo Koen Film Partners
Contact: SHOWGATE Inc. （Fumiki Yamazaki）yamazaki@showgate.jp
TOKYO KOEN
Production Summary
SHINJI AOYAMAs stylish ways have over the years gripped at the hearts of the
audiences around the world and now here is a story about love
This story illustrates and portrays from various distances the different ways
and shapes of love that are found among the parks in Tokyo an oasis a brief
break from the busy lives of the city In doing so we would like to shine a new
light on to the parks themselves that we find so close to our everyday lives
We feel that a stifling time like this desperately calls for a moment of breather
to give existences like that a moment of thought
Through this film we hope to deliver the various shapes of LOVE that are
found in such parks that are found all around the world
Synopsis
The story centers around the yearold KOJI SHIDA a young university
student in architecture and a future photographer His passion in life is to take
photos of families that visit the parks MIYU TOMINAGA is a part time jobber
also and is Kojis childhood friend She has long been secretly in love with
him although she does not have the courage to tell him her feelings HIRO
TAKAI is a somewhat mysterious man a roommate of Kojis and Miyus ex
boyfriend
MISAKI SHIDA is Kojis sisterinlaw through their parents remarriage She is
an industrial designer and a ripe woman of age and passionately in love
with Koji Miyu is very much aware of Misakis feelings for him The threesome
relationship takes a great turn when Koji is faced with a queer mission The
mission comes from a dentist by the name of TAKASHI HATUSHIMA a man of
age who asks Koji to spy on a certain woman and take her photos
Koji is troubled by this mans request afraid that he is getting involved in some
kind of love affair problem However he finds that Takashis beautiful young
wife YURIKA HATSUSHIMA aged just floats from one park to another in
Tokyo with her yearold daughter KARIN in tow
What truth is hidden behind all this?
Directors Note
I love action movies and I would certainly love to film a horror movie but I
wanted to film a story where a boy and a girl meet fall in love and eventually
part ways A story simple as that; a story purely about blossoming youth This
was something that had been on my mind for quite some years
The reason for this is because I feel that to put a story like that together as a
film would require true aptitude for film direction
There is a French film titled White Nights French: Quatre nuits dun
rveur by Robert Bresson
It is based on a short story by Fyodor Dostoevsky and this too is a simple film
about youths A film so simple composed by almost nothing else but young
flesh and fleeting glances but Bresson takes these simple ingredients and
creates a vivid story fiercely bursting with suspense I wanted to travel deep in
search for the secret to how he achieves this I have long sought for the answer
to my question
And one day I came across this novel TOKYO KOEN
A university student who is into photography His childhood friend The
roommate A queer mission The sisterinlaw
The story seems so simple; yet the fleeting glances exchanged among the
characters vividly illustrate a sense of life The mood of the sentences are in
fact quite gentle almost impassionate and detached from human sensuality
However this in turn seems to blow raw and vivid life in to the characters I
felt that these characters with their flesh so vivid yet so frail had a strange
charm to them This is drama I thought And this drama illuminates the truth
that the fleeting glances exchanged among the characters reflect the distances
felt between them And whats more it is this very process that adds suspense
to the story
By sincerely illustrating these charming inhabitants of TOKYO KOEN I
believe that we will come very close to reaching an extremity in filmmaking
experience
While I was working on the script I realized that I hear dialogues as sound
and I particularly insisted on the dialogues being sung by the actors This
made the whole experience intensely exciting
Details
Film title: TOKYO KOEN original Japanese title
Based on the original novel TOKYO KOEN YUKIYA SHOJI Shinchosha Co
Ltd
Screen play and Direction by SHINJI AOYAMA EUREKA SAD VACATION
Produced by TOKYO KOEN film partners
Production Co: drights Inc
Coproduction: Showgate IncAMUSE Inc
NIKKATSU CORPORATIONHakuhodo DY media partners Inc
MemoryTech CorporationYahoo JAPAN Corporation
World Sales: Showgate Inc
Casts:
Haruma Miura
Koji
Nana Eikura
Miyu
Manami Konishi Misaki
Haruka Igawa
Yurika
Crew:
Director Shinji Aoyama
Producer Hiroaki Saito Yasushi Yamazaki
Cinematography Yuta Tsukinaga
Lighting Toru Saito
Sound Engineer Nobuyuki Kikuchi
Art Director Tsuyoshi Shimizu
Film Editor Hidemi Lee
Music Shinji Aoyama Isao Yamada
Dialogues Maasaki Uchida Norihiko Goda Shinji Aoyama
Director: SHINJI AOYAMA
Born in Kitakyushu July Shinji made his debut as film director with
Helpless His film EUREKA won the Prize of the Ecumenical Jury at the
rd Cannes Film Festval in He entered the th Cannes Film Festival
competition with Desert Moon His latest feature film Sad Vacation was exhibited at the th Venice
International Film Festival and his short film Le Petit Chaperon rouge was
produced at the Thtre de Gennevilliers France
Shinji is also a novelist and he novelized his own film EUREKA which was
awarded the th Yukio Mishima Prize
Producer: HIROAKI SAITO
Born in Hiroshima January Hiroaki joined Kazuya Konakas film crew
while he was still at the university of Gakushuin After graduating he was
employed at the Directors Company Corporation as the companys final public
recruitment Currently assigned to working with drights Hiroaki has worked
on
various
productions
including
feature
films
TV
drama
series
dancetheatrical show recordings
His representative works include feature film Embalming dir Shinji Aoyama
TV drama Task Force dir Isao Yukisada the th Method Fest
grandprix prize winning Runin dir Eiji Okuda th Pusan International
Film Festival exhibition film Dreaming of Light dir Sujin Kim and th
Pusan International Film Festival competition film Lost Paradise In Tokyo dir
Kazuya Shiraishi His latest production is Milocrorze dirYoshimasa Ishibashi starring Takayuki
Yamada