Mayonaka (2022) – Robert Capria.

Visually arresting, strongly acted downer noir, set during one fateful evening at Japan's Shinjuku station. A lonely, entrancingly beautiful, deeply despairing young woman Kimi (Nanami Akatsuki) happens upon a creep-o Vloggers lost smart phone and spontaneously documents her random experiences, her hopes for happiness, or a sexual encounter materialize in the amiably shambling form of a troubled Middle-aged man Akira(Tsuyoshi Takashiro) drunkenly celebrating his resignation. While low-budget, Mayonaka provides exemplary performances, relatable human drama, and the brightly persistent, harshly inorganic colours of the busy station are crisply captured on HD video. A dark-toned, compellingly interior narrative that benefits greatly from the vivid contrasts of the consistently populous, ceaselessly kinetic metropolitan hubbub at, and surrounding Shinjuku station. Bitter-sweet, melancholy themes abound throughout, with Kumi's exquisitely sad face providing a strangely hypnotic mirror to her unpredictable nocturnal adventuring. A timid, would-be songbird who, sadly, might never find her her true voice. Mayonaka is robustly structured, with an equally rigorous text, and the protagonists felt alive, rather than mere cyphers. To give the writer/director additional credit, while it is made quite clear all will not end well, he is engagingly subtle about it. Deceptively banal, with eloquent silences, the intimate, crimson-hued Karaoke scene between Kimi and Akira proved exceptionally moving.