When their izakaya restaurant burns down in an accident and their savings are wiped out by a compensation claim, young marrieds Kanya and Satoko don’t know where to turn. Kanya has a drunken one-night stand with a woman he meets on the subway, and emerges from it with a cash windfall. Once she gets past her anger, Satoko sees a way forward: she pushes Kanya into feigning marriage proposals to a series of vulnerable women, including a burly weightlifter and an unhappy prostitute. He fuels their emotions with hard-luck stories which persuade them to part with their savings…

Nishikawa Miwa has left Kore-eda Hirokazu’s mentorship far behind, but her cunning new exploration of the gap between pretence and sincerity that taps rich ambiguities and unspoken feelings is up there with the best of Kore-eda. Her emotionally wrenching drama suggests how subconscious feelings may drive immoral behaviour. Four features into her career, she’s clearly one of Japan’s subtlest and most original directors.

— Tony Rayns