Hold Your Breath Like a Lover 息を殺して Dir: Kohei Igarashi (2014)

Hold Your Breath Like a Lover   

Hold Your Breath Like a Lover Film Poster

息を殺して  「Iki wo Koroshite」

Release Date: June 20^th, 2015

Running Time: 85 mins.

Director: Kohei Igarashi

Writer: Kohei Igarashi (Screenplay),

Starring: Ran Taniguchi, Goichi Mine, Yusuke Inaba, Koji Harada, Tomomitsu Adachi, Ran Arai, Rina Tanaka, Yuki Inagaki

Tumblr   IMDB

This has been a film that has haunted me ever since I first saw the trailer back in 2014 and it was one of the films I was hoping to find in 2020. Well, I did. I ended up viewing it a couple of times. My initial impressions from the trailer was that this felt like it had “shades of Pulse (2001)” and an “apocalypse angle” but it turned out to be something else entirely, a subtle, gorgeous and melancholy take on the anxiety felt on the path of adulthood and a gradual maturation of its characters. It’s story is simple, perfect for allowing the powerful atmospherics to wash over me and pull me along.