「私ばっかり前向いててなんか悪いやつみたいじゃん。」
[I’m the only one always looking forward, and that makes me look like the bad guy.] 

In the changing landscape of Tokyo, two siblings navigate the city, haunted by the absence of their mother (Haruka Igawa). The return of their father (Kenichi Endo), a renowned architect, might be their last chance for reconciliation. 

With Brand New Landscape (見はらし世代), Yuiga Danzuka questions what modern family means through the prism of social issues facing Japan. Rather than dwelling on personal introspection, he invites the viewer to grasp the image of family in a broader sense.

The Family

In Tokyo’s Shibuya district, Ren (Kodai Kurosaki) works as a butterfly orchid deliveryman. After losing his mother, Yumiko, in childhood, and with his father, Hajime, having left, choosing work over family, he and his sister are the closest thing to a family. One day, Ren coincidentally meets his father during a delivery. When he tells his sister Emi (Mai Kiryu), absorbed in her wedding preparations, Ren decides to bridge the gap that has formed within their broken family.

Here, family resembles a memory, a ghost, rather than a functional unit. The director questions whether someone who fails to be a “good father” in private, despite his service to the public good, could reflect a universal image of fatherhood in contemporary Japan. No, it’s not a very positive image of fatherhood, even for Japanese culture.

A little more…

Brand New Landscape (見はらし世代) offers us a son character who wants his father to apologize so they can rediscover what a family is. Through the son’s return, life offers the father a second chance to confront his regrets.

But when one has rebuilt their life without their children, with another person who doesn’t have and doesn’t want children, what happens when one discovers they have regrets? This is what the viewer will witness throughout the film. A slow, sensory movie that gives the viewer plenty of time to question their own life choices.

Brand New Landscape (見はらし世代) is presented at VIFF on October 4 and 5, 2025.

Trailer