“Drive My Car”s Oscar-winning director Ryusuke Hamaguchi is set to make his next film, “All of the Sudden,” in Paris with a glamorous female duo led by Virginie Efira (“Benedetta”) and Tao Okamoto (“The Wolverine”).
Hamaguchi, who is currently in Paris preparing for the movie, penned the script with Léa Le Dimna, loosely inspired by a collection of real-life exchanged letters published in the book “Youn and I – The Illness Suddenly Get Worse,” by Makiko Miyano and Maho Isono.
“All of the Sudden” is produced by David Gauquié, Julien Deris, Jean-Luc Ormières, Renan Artukmaç at Paris-based Cinefrance Studios; Hiroko Matsuda, Kosuke Oshida, Yuji Sadai at Japan’s Office Shirous & Bitters End; Bettina Brokemper at Germany’s Heimat Film; and Joseph Rouschop at Belgium’s Tarantula. Diaphana, who handled Hamaguchi’s last three movies, will release “All of the Sudden” in France, while Bitters End will distribute it in Japan.
Cinefrance International is handling world sales outside of Asia which is represented by Bitters End. The two companies will unveil the project to buyers at the Cannes Film Market.
Hamaguchi broke through the international scene in a major way in 2022, after garnering four Oscar nominations for “Drive My Car,” including best director and adapted screenplay, as well as Japan’s first ever for best picture, and won for best international feature. Since then, he directed “Evil Does Not Exist” which premiered at Venice and won the Silver Lion and the Fipresci prize, and the experimental silent piece “Gift.”
“After ‘Drive My Car,’ I received various offers and this was the only one that caught my attention at that time because I was so deeply moved by the correspondence between these two women,” said Hamaguchi during an interview, alongside Gauquié, Ormières and Artukmaç, at the offices of Cinefrance in Paris.
In the book “You and I — The Illness Suddenly Get Worse,” which was brought to Hamaguchi by Matsuda from Office Shirous, a philosopher and an anthropologist are exchanging letters discussing their thoughts on chance and risk, and their relationship develops into something more personal when the philosopher’s health suddenly deteriorates.
“Death becomes a subject they discuss and exchange a lot about, and gradually, it becomes an encounter between two souls,” says Hamaguchi, who ultimately decided to transpose the story in France, and turn the epistolary relationship into a real one between two women, a Japanese theater director and French director of a nursing home.
The film will shoot mainly in Paris. “I’d like to show a Paris that’s a little different from the clichés we might have about the city,” says Hamaguchi. “I’m starting to discover some places that aren’t touristy. So I think that will give a slightly different view of Paris than usual,” he continued.
“All of the Sudden” will mark Hamaguchi’s first collaboration with Gauquié at Cinefrance, whom he met in 2022 during one of his trips to Japan once the country had reopened its borders after the pandemic.
“I had been eager to meet (Hamaguchi) for some time because I love his work so we sat at a café in Shibuya and instead of discussing a specific project, we talked about French cinema in general,” Gauquié says. The producer said he noticed Hamaguchi was French cinema buff and “expressed (their) clear intention to produce (his) next feature.”
“French cinema has always been an important inspiration for me but also for many other Japanese people and Japanese filmmakers. Chabrol, of course, but to a larger extent the Nouvelle Vague,” says Hamaguchi, who also cited “Rohmer, Rivette, Godard, Truffaut, obviously, and even before them Grémillon, Becker, Renoir and Bresson.” He’s currently “trying desperately to learn French,” he says, adding that “much of my vision as a filmmaker is also based on French cinema.”
Hamaguchi and Gauquié were also connected through Kiyoshi Kurosawa who made his 2024 thriller “Serpent’s Path” with Cinefrance. “Knowing that David (Gauquié) had worked with Kiyoshi Kurosawa, who is one of my teachers, it was as if the stars were aligned for us to work on this project together,” says Hamaguchi.
When they started developing the project, Hamaguchi explains that they thought about what could create this bridge between France and Japan, and came up with a treatment approach called ‘humanitude.’ “It’s French method that was imported in Japan and is now practiced in several venues there, and puts the human dimension at the heart of the treatment care, for the integrity of each human being.” The concept of ‘humanitude’ is applied to other fields, including the film world.
Speaking of the cast, Hamaguchi says he’s known Virginie Efira “mainly through the films she made with Paul Verhoeven, particularly ‘Benedetta.’” “When I found out I was going to be able to work with her, I was really eager and happy,” he continued.
As for Okamoto, he saw her in James Mangold’s “Wolverine” and noted she “also started a career in Japan.” “They are both really talented actresses,” pointed out Hamaguchi.
For the last two years, the Japanese filmmaker has been traveling to France to develop his project and ever hosted a workshop with French actors to see how they work. “It’s an approach I’ve never seen before, but I found it very interesting,” Gauquié said.
The film is co-production between France, Belgium, Germany and Japan. “Ryusuke (Hamaguchi) is a very unique filmmaker who is extremely skilled at writing dialogues,” said Sadai at Japan’s Office Shirous & Bitters End. “His scripts and mise en scene make him stand out of all other directors in Japan,” Sadai continued.
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