Shoplifters

Cert: 15A; Now showing

I loved this. And as it won the Palme d’Or this year I was not alone in my affection for this Japanese family drama from prolific writer-director Hirokazo Kore-eda. It’s deceptively simple, sweet, often funny, thoughtprovoking, moving but never mawkish and really accessible. Don’t let the prize or the subtitles, or the fact critics like it, put you off.

Apparently Osamu (Franky Lily) and his wife Nobuyo (Sakura Ando) live with Granny (Kirin Kiki who died in September) tweenage son Shota (Jyo Kairi) and Nobayo’s sister Aki (Mayu Matsuoka) in a ramshackle over crowded apartment. On their way back from a shoplifting foray, Osamu and Shota see a small girl locked out in the cold. They’ve clearly seen her before and decide to bring her back with them for some food. The family doesn’t make a fuss, they’re more interested in whether they got the right shampoo. They feed the little girl who turns out to be five and called Juri (Sasaki Miyu). She also turns out to be covered in scars and in no hurry to go home, so they keep for her for the night, and then a little longer. It’s not kidnapping if you don’t ask for a ransom.

Juri becomes part of a family we learn to know, character by appealing character, their unorthodox story told with a detail-speckled patience that builds quietly until it shifts gear into drama.

What does family mean? What does love mean? And what’s the deal with poverty? Shoplifters looks at it all.