Ano natsu, ichiban shizukana umi (A Scene at the Sea) (1992)

Featured Audience Ratings

• Anthony L

  
  I know how good Kitano is as a director and nor am I shocked by his more sensitive side, it is present in even his more violent films but for some reason I was still surprised and completely awestruck by this films beauty. There is nothing I dislike about it! A new favourite film!

• El Hombre I

  
  A sweet love story and an ode to surfing without the violence that Kitano was, and is, notorious for. Even without a storyline centering around cops and yakuza, the film is distinctly Kitano. The central characters, Shigeru and Takako are deaf, and they do not utter one word of… More
  A sweet love story and an ode to surfing without the violence that Kitano was, and is, notorious for. Even without a storyline centering around cops and yakuza, the film is distinctly Kitano. The central characters, Shigeru and Takako are deaf, and they do not utter one word of dialogue in the entire film. As with all of Kitano's films, this is one that makes the viewer slow down and take in the film's style and story. Kitano's trademark minimalism here results in a film that unreels as a series of snapshots of a perfect summer. Heartbreaking, uplifting and simply beautiful. <a href="http://s273.photobucket.com/albums/jj203/goji9000/?action=view&current=ASceneAtSea.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://i273.photobucket.com/albums/jj203/goji9000/ASceneAtSea.jpg" border="0" alt="Photobucket Image Hosting"></a>

• Lesley N

  
  You have to admire Takeshi Kitano's audaciousness....five minutes in, and i was thinking surely this isn't the whole plot... but yes, it was. A deaf Japanese garbage man learns to surf. That's it. But as with all his films, the joy is in the details and the spaces… More
  You have to admire Takeshi Kitano's audaciousness....five minutes in, and i was thinking surely this isn't the whole plot... but yes, it was. A deaf Japanese garbage man learns to surf. That's it. But as with all his films, the joy is in the details and the spaces between the details - especially the silent relationship between Shigeru and his ever-supportive clothes-folding girlfriend. Joe Hisaishi's soundtrack, made up from leftover bits of TOTORO, is a charmer too..