Completion screening event of new movie "Narratage"

The completion screening event of new movie "Narratage" was held at TOHO Cinemas Roppongi Hills on 23 August which was attended by the director Yukisada Isao and the lead actors Matsumoto Jun and Arimura Kasumi. The movie will be screened in cinemas from 7 October.

The story is based on the same-titled novel written by Shimamoto Rio in 2005 when she was just 20 which was one of the nominees for the 18th Yamamoto Shugoro Award and sold 350,000 copies to date. Matsumoto plays the role of a senior high school teacher Hayama Takashi while Arimura plays his student Kudo Izumi. Due to their relationship, Izumi had to suppress her feelings for Hayama although she had been holding a torch for him. Years later when Izumi is an university student, she is asked to go back to the acting club of her senior high school to help out and reunites with Hayama which marks the beginning of their forbidden romance. Sakaguchi Kentaro plays the role of Ono Reiji, an university student who is Izumi's boyfriend and gets jealous over her love for Hayama.

Before the press conference, the trio appeared on the red carpet where Matsumoto escorted Arimura by holding her hand. As the movie was shot last summer, Matsumoto commented that he was excited about the movie being finally ready to be seen by everyone especially since they had worked every hard on every scene in this bittersweet and intense love story. As such, he hoped that everyone will love this movie for a long time. Arimura echoed his view by saying that she was 23 when she shot this movie and felt as if she had gone through a romance which she would never be able to forget so she was very proud of the movie. Even though the story may be controversial and everyone may not agree with the love between the lead characters, she hoped that everyone will be reminded of the people dearest to them after watching this movie.

As Matsumoto will be celebrating his 34th birthday on 30th August, there was a surprise birthday celebration for him. A huge birthday cake was presented to him with the word "Narrata-jun" which was meant to combine the movie's title with his name. However, the letter "n" was missing so he expressed regret that it was somewhat imperfect. Yukisada and Arimura also offered their congratulations and well-wishes to Matsumoto.

Sources: Nikkansports 1 / Nikkansports 2 / Nikkansports 3 / Eiga.com