Love Letter

The directorial debut of the great Japanese actress and filmmaker Kinuyo Tanaka, who made 15 films with director Kenji Mizoguchi, Love Letter is a vivid evocation of post-war Tokyo a year after the American occupation ended.

The film follows repatriated veteran Reikichi, who searches for his lost love while translating romantic letters from Japanese women to American GIs. The film is a nuanced and perceptive romantic drama with a deft critique of patriarchal hypocrisy.

“Love Letter should be considered a postwar classic… in Kinuyo Tanaka’s first directorial work, we see a much-needed female voice that offers a much more nuanced reading of women’s lives in postwar Japan.” — Natalie Ng, Filmed in Ether