Yoji Yamada's remake of Kon Ichikawa's "Otouto (Younger Brother)" gets a teaser trailer

by Chris MaGee

At the beginning of this year it was reported that Yoji Yamada had chosen to update one of Japan's most beloved films, Kon Ichikawa's 1960 "Otouto (Younger Brother)". The original film starred Keiko Kishi and Hiroshi Kawaguchi as sister and brother, the former level-headed and the former unconventional, but their relationship changes when the brother becomes deathly ill with tuberculosis. Production on Yamada's remake has wrapped and now Nippon Cinema has got the first teaser trailer for it. In place of Kishi and Kawaguchi Yamada has cast Sayuri Yoshinaga and Tsurube Shofukutei as the grown siblings, Ginko and Tetsuro, and and young stars Yu Aoi and Ryo Kase as Ginko’s daughter Koharu and Koharu's boyfriend respectively. The real buzz surrounding Yamada's "Otouto" is that it marks the first time in a decade that the 77-year-old director has made a film set in the present day.

Check out the teaser for "Otouto (Younger Brother)" at Nippon Cinema here.