You may want to check in with loved ones after seeing Doris Dörrie’s Cherry Blossoms (Kirschblüten – Hanami), a visually stunning film about the impermanence of life.  Since debuting at the 2008 Berlin Film Festival, the film has won many accolades, including Best Actor for Elmar Wepper at the 2008 German Film Awards (Germany’s Academy Awards).

Trudie (Hannelore Elsner) and Rudi (Wepper) are a long-married couple who live in the Bavarian countryside.  They love each other but are very different. Trudi is an artsy type who enjoys Butoh (a blend of Japanese modern and German expressionist dance) and dreams of Japan, a country she’s never visited.  Rudi, on the other hand, is a civil servant, quite content with everyday routine.

One day the couple travels to Berlin to see their children and grandchildren, only to discover that the kids are so caught up in their own lives, they don’t have time for Trudi and Rudi.  Then Trudi unexpectedly dies, leaving Rudi devastated and alone.  Impulsively, Rudi flies to Toyko, just in time for cherry blossom season.  He begins to explore the country and culture that Trudi loved so much.  It’s a quest that will take him to the foot of Mt. Fuji.

The film is filled with splendid motifs – flies, dandelions, cherry blossoms, water and the white face of a butoh dancer.  It marks the third film that acclaimed German writer/director Doris Dörrie has at least partially shot in Japan, following Enlightment Guaranteed and The Fisherman and His Wife.  Her documentary How to Cook Your Life, about a Zen priest, also showed her love for the East.

The film is in German, Japanese and English with English subtitles.

Cherry Blossoms is being released in Canada by Mongrel Media.