kai sholmes blog

TIFF: My Sunshine (2024)

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My Sunshine by Okuyama Hiroshi depicts Takuya’s journey of learning ice skating. Through this journey, the story highlights the ups and downs between Takuya, the coach, Arakawa, and his skating partner, Sakura. I watched My Sunshine during the TIFF screening on September 10th, along with the Q&A with the director after the screening.

During the Q&A, I got to ask the question, “The film description mentions Hirokazu Kore-eda (Shoplifters, Monster). What inspirations did you have while creating this film? It doesn’t have to be directors, anything that directly inspired the story or visual and cinematography.”

Okuyama answered, “As far as Kore-eda’s influence, I collaborated with him on a Netflix series, so I did learn a lot from him. One thing that was very impressive about Mr. Kore-eda is he would keep changing the screenplay and the dialogues, so until the shooting starts, the actors have already memorised the lines, but he still managed to change the lines. I thought ‘oh my god, this is great’ but when I do it, the actors really didn’t like that. Another thing that I copied from him is when he’s using child actors, he doesn’t give them the script, he tells them—just before the shooting starts—‘this is what you’re gonna say.’ So this is something I took from him.”

When I was watching the film, I got a distinct impression of Hirokazu Kore-eda, from the technical choices to the story elements. In My Sunshine, Okuyama was conscious of each scene’s diegetic sound, creating an intimate atmosphere that brings the audience closer to the slow, intricate life on a small island. Non-diegetic music rarely appears, utilising it so that its impact is greater whenever it’s present, like how we feel Sakura’s grace whenever she dances to Clair De Lune. This careful technical choice reflects the mood of the plot, where Okuyama described it as a story involving ice skating, but is really about the characters’ relationships. In My Sunshine, we experience the children’s passion, their relationship with their families, and we witness the adult life of coach Arakawa and his struggles with being queer. None of these were ever explicitly stated, but through subtle storytelling, the themes came across in a way that feels truly genuine. Those were all the things I’ve felt watching Hirokazu Kore-eda movies. Through My Sunshine, the influence that director Okuyama Hiroshi gained while collaborating with Hirokazu Kore-eda seems apparent.