Love hurts. In a small isolated roadside diner Ichio, a lonely cook, spends day in and day out behind his stove. Abandoned by his mother and resentful of his eccentric father, it is clear that Ichio is not a happy camper. But salvation is at hand. One day a young couple arrives. When the boyfriend splits, Ichio compassionately offers Taeko, the woman, a job and lodging, an offer that becomes for him, the beginning of a bittersweet romance. Ichio falls madly in love, in short order. While both players certainly have their own agendas, the relationship forces Ichio to come to grips with his own unsettling history. By setting this tender love story in the remote northern islands of Japan, where the sky is particularly crisp and clear, and the landscape vast, director Kazuyoshi Kumakiri puts the small steps of a man getting his life together into sharp focus.

Japan, 2001. 127 min.