
International Premiere
Rikiya Imaizumi’s haunting drama offers an uncommon take on a common problem: how can we know what’s truly inside the hearts and minds of others? As the film begins, Kanae (Yoko Maki) is reopening the bathhouse she shut down when her husband Satoru (Eita Nagayama) vanished without a trace. When Hori (Arata Iura) shows up looking for work, an uneasy companionship begins to form; meanwhile, private investigator Yamasaki (Lily Franky) is investigating Satoru’s disappearance. Gradually, it emerges that Kanae is a woman with two burdens: a mystery she can’t solve and a secret she doesn’t dare reveal. Adapting a manga by Tetsudo Toyoda, Rikiya crafts a film that asks for the viewer’s patience and rewards it amply: the leisurely pace, muted emotions, and psychological ambiguity are the perfect set-up for a series of stunning revelations. Contemplative, poetic, and deceptively casual, Undercurrent is provocative in the questions it asks and richly rewarding in the answers it provides.
Media Partner
Yoko Maki, Arata Iura, Noriko Eguchi, Eita Nagayama, Lily Franky
Japan
2023
Panorama
Japanese
Book Tickets
Indigenous & Community Access
Credits
Executive Producer
Kentaro Koike, Masahiro Handa
Producer
Kentaro KOIKE, Masahiro HANDA, Akihiro HIRAISHI
Screenwriter
Kaori Sawai, Rikiya Imaizumi
Cinematography
Hiroshi Iwanaga
Editor
Masaya Okazaki
Production Design
Yukihisa Satosu
Original Music
Haruomi Hosono
Director

Rikiya Imaizumi
Born in Fukushima Prefecture in 1981, Rikiya Imaizumi made his directorial debut with the music documentary Tama no Eiga in 2010. Since his debut, he has continued to make love stories with a unique sensibility, Where Is Love (2018) was a smash hit in Japan, gaining tremendous support from young audiences. Little Nights, Little Love (2019) was selected in the competition of Shanghai International Film Festival 2019 and By the Window (2022) won Audience Award in Tokyo International Film Festival 2022.
Filmography: Where Is Love (2018); Little Nights, Little Love (2019); By the Window (2022)
Missing VIFF? Check out what's playing at the VIFF Centre
The Teacher
In this potent thriller, English teacher Basem witnesses the murder of a teenager by a Israeli settler. While the subsequent investigation rolls slowly towards a foregone conclusion, the teacher is caught up in a parallel kidnapping case...
Bob Trevino Likes It
When her toxic, narcissistic dad cuts her out of his life, Lily Trevino looks him up on Facebook and happens across his namesake, Bob (John Leguizamo), a gentle, genial contractor who lives nearby, and who proves an altogether better dad...
The Encampments
When pro-Palestine protests took hold of Columbia last year, the filmmakers were there from the beginning. This documentary charts the mounting tensions between students and the administration, as the protests were picked up across North America.
Shepherds
Mathyas quits his marketing job in Montreal and goes to France with the romantic notion of becoming a shepherd. He's in for a rude awakening... Based on a true story, Deraspe's stirring film plays spiritual uplift off against some 3000 sheep and a donkey.
Our Lady of the Nile
Veronica and Virginia are inseparable friends at an elite Catholic boarding school, Our Lady of the Nile, but what binds them together is the very thing that separates them forever. We are in Rwanda, 1973, and tribal tensions are simmering ominously.
Faces
Ten years after his landmark debut, Shadows, John Cassavetes returned to the indie model, self-financing this wrenching portrait of the sexual mores and miseries of American middle class. Gena Rowlands is luminous as Jeannie, the film's emotional barometer.