Tokyo Sonata

Tokyo Sonata follows the Sasaki family, an ordinary middle-class household in Tokyo, as it comes apart. Ryuhei, the father, loses his office job when his employer moves the work to cheaper staff in China. Rather than tell his wife Megumi and their two sons, he keeps up the pretence of going to work each day while he searches for a new position, joining the hidden world of men concealing their unemployment. Megumi runs the home and raises the boys, the elder son grows distant, and the younger, Kenji, takes piano lessons against his father's wishes. The lies pile up and the family drifts further apart.

Kiyoshi Kurosawa directed and co-wrote the film with Max Mannix and Sachiko Tanaka. It is the sixth of the fifteen films he has directed, arriving between Pulse and Creepy, and it turns away from the horror associated with his earlier work toward domestic drama. Teruyuki Kagawa plays Ryuhei and Kyoko Koizumi plays Megumi, with Kai Inowaki and Yū Koyanagi as the sons, supported by Haruka Igawa and Kanji Tsuda.

Made for about two million dollars, the film drew strong notices. Critics rated it 7.5 out of 10 across 87 reviews. On IMDb it holds 7.6 from around 14,000 votes, and on TMDB 7.4 from roughly 294 votes, a smaller but similar response, suggesting the film reached a modest audience that rated it favourably.