“I’m a movie director. I want you to star in my next project.”

Big screen star Shina Mizuhara (Ui Mihara) has lost her passion for cinema and is now cynical and cruel. She decides to travel to New York with her boyfriend, but he leaves her as soon as they arrive. Without her wallet or phone, and speaking only Japanese, her day promises to be difficult. Then Shina meets Jack (Estevan Muñoz), a low-budget film director who convinces her to star in his next movie.

With I Fell in Love with a Z-Grade Director in Brooklyn, Kenichi Ugana delivers his very first romantic comedy, which skillfully blends genres and delivers powerful laughs.

A New Register for Ugana

If you’re a fan of Japanese underground genre cinema, you probably know the name Kenichi Ugana. If not, perhaps this text will make you want to discover him.

He creates works that are often quirky, mixing humor and horror, comical and strange characters, offering good entertainment while maintaining a large dose of originality.

But the Japanese filmmaker doesn’t just make horror films like Visitors: complete edition, or UFOs like Extraneous matter: complete edition. He makes experimental cinema like The Girls, and end-of-the-world comedies like We Are Aliens. But something he hadn’t done until now was a romantic comedy. That’s what he’s offering this year as a world premiere at Fantasia. And Fantasia is clearly the right place for this kind of film.

But don’t be fooled, this film still adheres to romantic comedy clichés, from the chance encounter, small abuses, arguments, all the way to reconciliation. But Ugana’s touch makes it an out-of-the-ordinary, completely crazy, and exhilarating film.

Cheap in the Service of Quality

This time, rather than using cheap visual effects directly, he uses them in his “film within the film.” Thus, the film the characters are shooting is a Z-grade flick (hence the title) with the most botched effects. One can think of the thick green vomit that poor Ui Mihara has to spew repeatedly.

This brings us to the main film, for which the director has a quality image. But since we alternate between a terrible image in Jack’s film and a beautiful image in the other scenes, we simply get the impression that the main image is extraordinary.

Moreover, the fact that the cheap horror film is truly awful makes the usual absurdities of a romantic comedy pass without being tiresome. If we add to that the fact that Jack speaks no Japanese at all and Shina doesn’t speak a word of English, we quickly find ourselves in a situation ripe for laughter. But while others might have focused on language-related misunderstandings, Ugana uses this issue to make the audience laugh, as they understand everything. Thus, we find ourselves with two characters who talk to themselves, but who are actually talking to the audience. In fact, on two occasions, Shina addresses the audience directly, breaking the fourth wall.

A Little More…

The result is an intelligent, hilarious, and touching romantic comedy, where Ui Mihara delivers an exceptional performance as Shina, while Estevan Muñoz perfectly embodies the charming and spontaneous Jack.

And because there’s nothing “normal” about Kenichi Ugana’s films, even those who hate romantic comedies are very likely to enjoy I Fell in Love with a Z-Grade Director.

Furthermore, the director gave us good news during the screening: a North American distributor will be distributing his films here. Don’t miss this opportunity.

I Fell in Love with a Z-Grade Director is being presented at the Fantasia Festival on July 23, 2025.

Trailer