Shoplifters (film)


Shoplifters is a 2018 Japanese drama film directed, written and edited by Hirokazu Kore-eda. Starring Lily Franky and Sakura Ando, it is about a non-biological family that relies on shoplifting to cope with a life of poverty.
Kore-eda wrote the screenplay contemplating what makes a family, and inspired by reports on poverty and shoplifting in Japan. Principal photography began in mid-December 2017.
The film premiered on 13 May 2018 at the Cannes Film Festival, where it won the Palme d'Or. The film was released in Japan on 8 June 2018 and was a critical and commercial success. Shoplifters won three Mainichi Film Awards, including Best Film, and the Asia Pacific Screen Award for Best Feature Film, and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film and the Golden Globe Award for Best Foreign Language Film.

Plot

In Tokyo, a group lives in poverty: Osamu, a day laborer forced to leave his job after twisting his ankle; his wife Nobuyo, who works for an industrial laundry service; Aki, who works at a hostess club; Shota, a young boy; and Hatsue, an elderly woman who owns the home and supports the group with her deceased husband's pension.
Osamu and Shota routinely shoplift goods, using a system of hand signals to communicate. Osamu tells Shota it is fine to steal things that have not been sold, as they do not belong to anyone. One cold night, they see Yuri, a neighbourhood girl they regularly observe locked out on an apartment balcony. They bring her to their home, intending to only have her stay for dinner, but choose not to return her after finding evidence of abuse.
Yuri bonds with her new family and learns to shoplift from Osamu and Shota. Osamu urges Shota to see him as his father and Yuri as his sister, but Shota is reluctant. The family learns on television that police are investigating Yuri's disappearance; the family cuts her hair, burns her old clothes, and gives her a new name: Lin.
Hatsue visits her husband's son from an affair, from whom she regularly receives money. The son and his wife are Aki's parents, who believe that their daughter is living in Australia. The family visits the beach and Hatsue expresses contentment that she will not die a lonely death. At home, she dies in her sleep. Osamu and Nobuyo bury her under the house and continue to collect her pension without reporting her death.
Osamu steals a purse from a car. Shota is uneasy, feeling this theft breaks their moral code. Shota recalls joining the family after Osamu and Nobuyo found him in a locked car. Increasingly guilt-ridden about teaching Yuri to steal, Shota interrupts her theft by stealing fruit from a grocery store in view of the staff. Cornered, he jumps from a bridge and breaks his leg.
Shota is hospitalised and detained. Osamu and Nobuyo attract the attention of the police and are caught after attempting to flee with Yuri and Aki. The authorities discover Yuri and the death of Hatsue and tell Shota that the family was going to abandon him. They inform Aki that Osamu and Nobuyo previously killed Nobuyo's abusive husband in a crime of passion and that Hatsue was receiving money from Aki's parents.
Nobuyo takes the blame for the crimes and is sentenced to prison. Shota is placed in an orphanage. Osamu and Shota visit Nobuyo in prison, and she gives Shota details of the car they found him in so he can search for his birth parents. Shota stays overnight with Osamu against the orphanage's rules. Osamu confirms that the family intended to abandon him and that he can no longer be his father.
The next morning, as he is about to depart, Shota says that he allowed himself to be caught. Osamu chases Shota's bus; Shota looks back and finally acknowledges Osamu as his father. Yuri is returned to her birth parents, who continue to neglect her.

Cast

Production

Director Hirokazu Kore-eda said that he developed the story for Shoplifters when considering his earlier film Like Father, like Son, with the question "What makes a family?" He had been considering a film exploring this question for 10 years before making Shoplifters. Kore-eda described it as his "socially conscious" film. With this story, Kore-eda said he did not want the perspective to be from only a few individual characters, but to capture "the family within the society", a "wide point of view" in the vein of his 2004 film Nobody Knows. He set his story in Tokyo and was also influenced by the Japanese Recession, including media reports of how people lived in poverty and of shoplifting. To research the project, Kore-eda toured an orphanage and wrote a scene inspired by a girl there who read from Swimmy by Leo Lionni.
Lily Franky and Sakura Ando joined the cast before principal photography began in mid-December 2017. Child actors Sasaki Miyu and Jyo Kairi were cast for their first film. Sosuke Ikematsu, Chizuru Ikewaki and Yūki Yamada joined the cast in February. It was also one of the last films Kirin Kiki appeared in before her death in 2018.
Production began in December 2017, with Fuji Television Network, Gaga, and AOI Pro producing. Cinematographer Kondo Ryuto used 35 mm film with an Arricam ST, aware 35 mm was a preference of Kore-eda's and also seeking the right texture and grain for the story.

Release

With Gaga Corporation as its distributor, the film was selected to screen at the 2018 Cannes Film Festival, where it went on to win the Palme d'Or. In Japan, it was scheduled for release on 8 June 2018. Magnolia Pictures also obtained the rights to distribute the film in North America. On 23 May 2018, Thunderbird Releasing acquired the UK distribution rights, while Road Pictures secured the rights to distribute it in China.

Reception

Box office

The film grossed in Japan by the end of 2018, making it the fourth highest-grossing domestic film of the year and the second highest-grossing Japanese live-action film of the year. In China, the film grossed, in what The Hollywood Reporter called "an unprecedentedly strong performance for an imported pure arthouse drama". Shoplifters also grossed $3,313,513 in the United States and Canada, and $17,398,743 in other territories, for a worldwide total of. This makes it the most successful commercially of the five nominees for the Academy Award for Best International Film.
In its tenth weekend of release in the United States and Canada, following its Oscar nomination, the film made $190,000 from 114 theaters, for a running total of $2.5 million up until then.

Critical response

On review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating 99% based on 219 reviews, with an average rating of 8.81/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "Understated yet ultimately deeply affecting, Shoplifters adds another powerful chapter to director Hirokazu Kore-eda's richly humanistic filmography." On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 93 out of 100, based on 40 critics, indicating "universal acclaim". Shoplifters was also listed on numerous critics' top ten lists for 2018.
Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian gave Shoplifters 4/5 stars, declaring it a "rich, satisfying film", but subsequently upgraded this to a 5/5 star review upon second viewing. The Guardian later ranked the film 15th in its Best Films of the 21st Century list. The Hollywood Reporter critic Deborah Young called it "bittersweet" as it "contrasts the frigid emotions of socially correct behavior with the warmth and happiness of a dishonest lower-class family". Robbie Collin of The Daily Telegraph awarded it five stars, hailing it as an "outstanding domestic drama, crafted by Kore-eda with crystalline insight and an unsparing emotional acuity".
For IndieWire, David Ehrlich gave it a grade of "A–" and wrote the film "stings" with "the loneliness of not belonging to anyone, and the messiness of sticking together". TheWraps Ben Croll declared it Kore-eda's "richest film to date". In Time Out, Geoff Andrew gave it four stars and saluted Kore-eda as "a modern-day Ozu". Varietys Maggie Lee also compared it to Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens; Lily Franky's character Osamu was likewise compared to Dickens' character Fagin.
In Japan, The Japan Times gave Shoplifters five stars, writing "The cheers are entirely deserved" and credited it for an "outwardly naturalistic" style.

Accolades

The film competed at the Cannes Film Festival, where it won the Palme d'Or on 19 May. It was the first Japanese Palme d'Or-winner since The Eel in 1997. Jury president Cate Blanchett explained the decision: "We were completely bowled over by Shoplifters. How intermeshed the performances were with the directorial vision". In July 2018, Shoplifters also won Best International Film at the Munich Film Festival, with the jury citing it by stating it "opens up new possibilities and ultimately offers hope".
In August, Shoplifters was selected as the Japanese entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 91st Academy Awards. It made the December shortlist in 2018, before being nominated for the Academy Award in January 2019.
AwardDate of ceremonyCategoryRecipientResult
Academy Awards24 February 2019Best Foreign Language Film
AACTA AwardsJanuary 2019Best Asian FilmKaoru Matsuzaki, Akihiko Yose and Hijiri Taguchi
Alliance of Women Film Journalists10 January 2019Best Non-English FilmHirokazu Kore-eda
Asian Film Awards17 March 2019Best Film
Asian Film Awards17 March 2019Best DirectorHirokazu Kore-eda
Asian Film Awards17 March 2019Best ActressSakura Ando
Asian Film Awards17 March 2019Best Supporting ActressMayu Matsuoka
Asian Film Awards17 March 2019Best Original MusicHosono Haruomi
Asian Film Awards17 March 2019Best Production DesignKeiko Mitsumatsu
Asia Pacific Screen Awards29 November 2018Best FilmKaoru Matsuzaki, Akihiko Yose and Hijiri Taguchi
Asia Pacific Screen Awards29 November 2018Best DirectingHirokazu Kore-eda
Asia Pacific Screen Awards29 November 2018Best ScreenplayHirokazu Kore-eda
Austin Film Critics Association7 January 2019Best Foreign Language Film
BAFTA Awards10 February 2019
Bodil Awards2 March 2019Best Non-American FilmHirokazu Kore-eda
Boston Society of Film Critics16 December 2018Best Foreign Language Film
Boston Society of Film Critics16 December 2018Best Ensemble Cast
British Independent Film Awards2 December 2018Best International Film
Cannes Film Festival8 – 19 May 2018Palme d'OrHirokazu Kore-eda
César Awards22 February 2019Best Foreign FilmHirokazu Kore-eda
Chicago Film Critics Association8 December 2018Best Foreign Language Film
Critics' Choice Movie Awards13 January 2019Best Foreign Language Film
Dallas–Fort Worth Film Critics Association17 December 2018Best Foreign Language Film
Denver Film Festival31 October – 11 November 2018Best Narrative Feature FilmHirokazu Kore-eda
Dublin Film Critics' Circle20 December 2018Best Film
Dublin Film Critics' Circle20 December 2018Best DirectorHirokazu Kore-eda
Florida Film Critics Circle21 December 2018Best Supporting ActressSakura Ando
Florida Film Critics Circle21 December 2018Best Foreign Language Film
Golden Globes6 January 2019Best Foreign Language Film
Guldbagge Awards28 January 2019Best Foreign FilmHirokazu Kore-eda
Independent Spirit Awards23 February 2019Best International FilmHirokazu Kore-eda
Japan Academy Prize1 March 2019Picture of the Year
Japan Academy Prize1 March 2019Director of the YearHirokazu Kore-eda
Japan Academy Prize1 March 2019Screenplay of the YearHirokazu Kore-eda
Japan Academy Prize1 March 2019Best EditingHirokazu Kore-eda
Japan Academy Prize1 March 2019Outstanding ActorLily Franky
Japan Academy Prize1 March 2019Outstanding ActressSakura Ando
Japan Academy Prize1 March 2019Outstanding Supporting ActressMayu Matsuoka
Japan Academy Prize1 March 2019Outstanding Supporting ActressKirin Kiki
Japan Academy Prize1 March 2019Outstanding MusicHaruomi Hosono
Japan Academy Prize1 March 2019Outstanding CinematographyRyūto Kondō
Japan Academy Prize1 March 2019Outstanding Lighting DirectionIsamu Fujii
Japan Academy Prize1 March 2019Outstanding Art DirectionKeiko Mitsumatsu
Japan Academy Prize1 March 2019Outstanding Sound RecordingKazuhiko Tomita
Kinema Junpo Awards28 January 2019Best Film
London Film Critics' Circle20 January 2019Film of the Year
London Film Critics' Circle20 January 2019Foreign Language Film of the Year
Los Angeles Film Critics Association9 December 2018Best Foreign Language Film
Mainichi Film Awards2019Best Film
Mainichi Film Awards2019Best ActressSakura Ando
Mainichi Film Awards2019Best Supporting ActressKirin Kiki
Munich Film Festival28 June – 7 July 2018Best International FilmHirokazu Kore-eda
National Board of Review27 November 2018Top 5 Foreign Language Films
Nikkan Sports Film Awards2018Best FilmHirokazu Kore-eda
Nikkan Sports Film Awards2018Best ActressSakura Ando
Nikkan Sports Film Awards2018Best Supporting ActressKirin Kiki
Online Film Critics Society2 January 2019Best Foreign Language Film
San Diego Film Critics Society10 December 2018Best Foreign Language Film
Satellite Awards17 February 2019Best Foreign Language Film
Seattle Film Critics Society17 December 2018Best Foreign Language Film
St. Louis Film Critics Association16 December 2018Best Foreign Language Film
Tokyo Sports Film Awards2019Best Film
Tokyo Sports Film Awards2019Best ActressSakura Ando
Tokyo Sports Film Awards2019Best ActorLily Franky
Vancouver Film Critics Circle17 December 2018Best Foreign Language Film
Vancouver International Film Festival27 September – 12 October 2018Most Popular International FeatureHirokazu Kore-eda
Washington D.C. Area Film Critics Association3 December 2018Best Foreign Language Film