Canada, Japan2025105 minEnglish, Japanese with English subtitlesToronto Premiere
Kana, a struggling visual artist, returns to Japan after years away in Vancouver to attend her beloved grandmother’s funeral. The familiar cadence of family dynamics endure and yet, everything feels different. While in Tokyo, Kana discovers her grandfather had a love of his life outside of his arranged marriage to her grandmother. Meanwhile, Kana reluctantly confronts her own messy romantic past with old flame Hiro to see if the embers of their love still flicker.
Adapted from a play and short film of the same name, powerhouse actor-writer-director Mayumi Yoshida presents an impressively romantic first feature, beautifully lensed across two timelines. Yoshida deftly balances swooning, dreamlike nostalgia with the universal realities of distance, time, and circumstance.
– Aram Siu Wai Collier
Mayumi Yoshida
Hana Kino
Ryo Tajima
OFFICIAL SELECTION
Vancouver International Film Festival, 2025
Mayumi Yoshida
Mayumi Yoshida 吉田真由美 is a Vancouver-based director, actor, and writer whose global upbringing shapes her “in-betweener” storytelling. An alum of TIFF Writer’s Studio and Warner Bros. Discovery Access, she directed the Juno-nominated Different Than Before, has won SXSW’s Jury Award, and screened at Oscar- and BAFTA-qualifying festivals.
9 Nov, 2025 7:00 pm
TIFF Lightbox C2PG
CONTENT ADVISORY
Death and dying
IN PERSON ACCESSIBILITY:
This film is being presented with English subtitles for all spoken dialogue (no sound cues indicated).
Wheelchair spaces and step-free seating is available for this screening – click below to book accessible seats.
Join us for a Q&A immediately after the screening with director Mayumi Yoshida, producer Nach Dudsdeemaytha, moderated by Reel Asian artistic director Aram Siu Wai Collier.
9:30PM at CSI Spadina
Join us at CSI Spadina for the Centrepiece Gala Party after the screening of AKASHI
9:30PM at CSI Spadina
A calm & quiet zone will be available at this event. If you require accessibility accommodation for this event, please click the link below.
Explore the XR worldbuilding practices of media artists working at the confluence of body, space, and technology.
The discussion will explore how festivals can better support accessibility — from accommodating filmmakers with disabilities and reaching diverse audiences, to guiding creators on inclusive practices like budgeting for captioning.
These films explore desire, both interpersonally and intrapersonally. Between quietly blossoming desires and glowing inner temptations, this collection strides toward you with a sly wink, a shy smile, and a glimmer in its eye.
Founded in Toronto in 1997, Reel Asian is Canada’s largest pan-Asian film festival and a year-round cultural organization dedicated to championing Asian and Asian diasporic artists and storytellers. What began as a grassroots film festival has grown into a national platform supporting filmmakers and audiences through screenings, education, industry initiatives, artist development, and community programming presented across Toronto, the GTA, and online across Canada.
401 Richmond Street West, The Commons (Suite 448)
Toronto, Ontario, M5V 3A8 Canada
(416) 703 – 9333
info@reelasian.com
Charitable number: 870021383RR0001
