Presented by Japan Foundation
Swimming in a Sand Pool
Directed by Nobuhiro Yamashita
Director
Nobuhiro Yamashita
Writer
Yumuka Nakada
Cast
Sakiaki Hamao, Reia Nakayoshi, Mikuri Kiyota, Sumire Hanaoka
contact
Pony Canyon Inc.
Under the relentless heat of a scorching July sun, four teenage girls find themselves with an unusual task: sweeping the sand-covered bottom of a swimming pool, remnants of a nearby baseball field. Based on a play written by a high-school student, Nakata Yumeka, and originally performed by the Tokushima City High School Drama Club, SWIMMING IN A SAND POOL is a tender coming-of-age story that explores questions of love, ambition, and gender equality. Each girl is there for a different reason. Miku (Reina Nakayoshi) and Kokoro (Saki Hamao) are being punished for missing gym class. The reluctant Chizuru (Mikuri Kiyota), the captain of the Swim Team, is there to refine her strokes (at the bottom of a sandy, empty pool). Finally, the compassionate Yui (Sumire Hanaoka) shows up and offers to help.
Part of the genre of films called seishun eiga (youth film), SWIMMING IN A SAND POOL touches on material familiar to director Nobuhiro Yamashita, best known for LINDA LINDA LINDA, which was about a teenage girl band. With this film, Yamashita once again strikes a perfect balance between bubblegum sweetness and the blunt, rebellious poetry of youth. With most of the film set at the swimming pool, the single location—an emblem of authority and neglect imposed by adults and indifferent peers—the singular setting gradually morphs into a sanctuary for the girls. The film has a childlike wonder at first as the girls discuss their more adolescent concerns, but soon opens up to discuss their role as women in the society at large. The act of sweeping, a mundane chore, emerges as a potent symbol of the societal expectation for women to clean up the messes left behind by others. SWIMMING IN A SAND POOL is a singular and heartwarming slice-of-life film about growing up and coming into your own. – Justine Smith
Showings
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