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Labyrinth of Cinema

2019

Nobuhiko Ôbayashi

Takuro Atsuki, Takako Tokiwa, Yoshihiko Hosoda, Rei Yoshida ...

6.7

68

Drama. War. Sci-Fi A group of young people travel back in time when they are in a movie theater just before closing time. They witness deaths during the closing days of Japan's feudal times and on the battlefront in China before they are sent to Hiroshima just before the Aug. 6, 1945, atomic bombing of the city.

	Author	Review
United States	Deborah Young The Hollywood Reporter	"Exuberantly shot (by cinematographer Hisaki Sanbongi) and imaginatively edited film (...) [It has] one of the most unforgettable images in all Obayashi’s work."	POS
United Kingdom	Peter Bradshaw The Guardian	"An epic blitz of pop-culture hyperactivity: baffling, surreal, tragicomic, then simply tragic (...) Rating: ★★★★ (out of 5)"	POS
United States	Natalia Keogan Paste Magazine	"Labyrinth of Cinema is both a summation of Obayashi’s craft and a literal homecoming. The film is a magnum opus that beautifully blends two prominent aspects of the director’s existing body of work"	POS
United States	Richard Kuipers Variety	"This phantasmagorical journey through Japanese history and cinema dazzles the eye and engages the mind for three amazing hours."	POS
Japan	Mark Schilling The Japan Times	"[It] is bursting with energy, passion and dreamlike invention, and while conveying a strong antiwar message, it is anything but preachy (…) Rating: ★★★★½ (out of 5)"	POS
United States	William Repass Slant	"Forget style over substance. Ôbayashi Nobuhiko’s swan song, 'Labyrinth of Cinema', is style as substance (…) Rating: ★★½ (out of 4)"	POS
United States	Glenn Heath Jr. The Film Stage	"Ôbayashi’s film always seems to be in a pleasant mood, indicative of a filmmaker at peace even while trying to plead for the audience to learn from mankind’s litany of misjudgments and power plays"	POS
United States	Dave White The Wrap	"A wild seminar about movies and life and war and peace, making a party out of sorrow, grabbing your fear and shaking it until it laughs and cries all at once."	POS
United States	Simon Abrams rogerebert.com	"A three-hour living will, and a dazzling curtain call (…) Rating: ★★★★ (out of 4)"	POS

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