Kumiko Hoshizaki’s “Akane Sasu Heya” is the story of Maki, a 20-something temp who is sick of her boring job and life in general. The rather bizarre solution she comes up with is to conceive a child behind her boyfriend’s back. Makoto Nagahisa offers the much more impressionistic “Frog.” The story meanders around a bunch of unrelated characters, using experimental techniques like repeated scenes, hallucinatory visuals, blurred shots and disconnected sounds. Lastly, we have “Bouquet Garni,” a much more conventional work from director Junpei Hatano. The plot is centered on a reporter, the relative of a kidnapping victim, and a woman who is obsessed with the case.
Nursing home "Yuyoso". Many lonely old people live there, including botanist Taro Makiso, a physicist, an actor, a bar mom, and a chef. Maki has spent most of his life studying botany, and has lived without regard for entertainment, drinking, women, or everything else in the world. Then came my 80th birthday. He and a young staff member go digging for wild yam and find a mysterious golden flower. It was the flower of immortality, the "Golden Flower", which was said to bloom beside the Himalayan Virgin, which he had been looking for for many years. From that day onwards, fragments of memories from his youth, which he had intentionally sealed off in order to immerse himself in botany, surged into Maki in a whirlpool.
