Japanese Film "Picture Bride"

Author Amy Tan called the Japanese film by Kayo Hatta "devastatingly beautiful."  The film itself is an epic story in which the natural and supernatural elements of the world blend together in way that could be called "sensual."  In fact, the film is based loosely upon true stories.  The story is about the picture brides of Hawaii a little after the turn of the 20th century.  In this film a young Japanese girl leaves home in 1918 for a man she had never met before who lives in a new world.  It was a place she could not imagine.  It happened to be America!

When she arrives in the tropical island paradise of Hawaii, the young girl has only a picture of her husband in hand.  She has already left behind all that she really knows for an arranged marriage with the man she has known only through this photograph and his letters.  So her arrival proves to be filled with unexpected discovery, hardship, and also joy.  The film features Youki Kudoh, Tamlyn Tomita, Toshiro Mifune.  "Picture Bride" won the Audience Award for Best Dramatic Film at the Sundance Film Festival.  The film is very moving.  It gives one aspect of what it means to be Japanese-American in a way that people every where can understand.... and personally appreciate!

Best regards from the East,

Harlan Urwiler

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