OAFF2021 Grand Prix (Best Picture Award)　＆　Audience Award

• World Premiere

Competition

Ito

いとみち

Director: YOKOHAMA Satoko (横浜聡子)

2021｜Japan｜116min｜Language: Japanese｜Subtitles: English

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Cast

KOMAI Ren (駒井蓮)
TOYOKAWA Etsushi (豊川悦司)
NISHIKAWA Yoko (西川洋子)

Synopsis

SOMA Ito (KOMAI Ren) is a high school student in Hirosaki City, Aomori. Her hobby is playing the Tsugaru shamisen, a three-string instrument that is popular in her home prefecture. She picked up the skill from her late mother, a talented shamisen player in her own right. While Ito can express herself through music, talking is a little harder due to shyness, which, when coupled with her strong Tsuguru dialect, makes it hard for her to communicate. And so she has few friends but, despite this, she has a strong inner spirit and she makes a big decision to start a part-time job at a maid cafe, much to the concern of her father Koichi (TOYOKAWA Etsushi). With every meeting that Ito has, her confidence begins to grow.

This is the latest film from YOKOHAMA Satoko, an award-winning director known for her work “The Actor” (2012). Both she and lead actress KOMAI Ren hail from Aomori Prefecture, the setting of the film. The story comes from a work by popular novelist KOSHIGAYA Osamu and its title, “Itomichi” 糸道（いとみち）comes from the scar which is formed in the nail of a Shamisen player from the string.

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• Competition
• Beyond You
• The Cemil Show
• The Con-Heartist
• Elisa's Day
• Emptiness
• Honeymood
• Hotel Iris
• Ito
• Killer Spider
• Nadia, Butterfly
• A Song for You
• The Slug
• Tiong Bahru Social Club
• The Way We Keep Dancing