Tetsuya Mariko’s Dear Stranger to Premiere at Busan 2025
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DEAR STRANGER Sets International Premiere at Busan 2025
Directed by Tetsuya Mariko | Starring Hidetoshi Nishijima & Gwei Lun-Mei
Presented by Roji Films and Toei
Tetsuya Mariko’s latest feature Dear Stranger will make its international premiere at the 2025 Busan International Film Festival in the A Window on Asian Cinema section. The film, led by Hidetoshi Nishijima (Drive My Car) and Gwei Lun-Mei (The Wild Goose Lake), will screen across three dates during the festival:
September 18 – 09:00 KST | LOTTE CINEMA Centum City 4
September 20 – 13:30 KST | Community Media Center
September 24 – 16:30 KST | CGV Centum City 6
SYNOPSIS
Set in New York, Dear Stranger follows Kenji, a Japanese assistant professor of architecture chasing tenure, and his wife Jane, a Taiwanese-American puppeteer-turned-homemaker. As they manage the silence of their own disappointments and a shared past they refuse to acknowledge, a single moment shatters everything: their young son Kai disappears. What unfolds is a quiet but devastating unraveling of a marriage shaped by sacrifice, alienation, and unresolved trauma.
ABOUT THE DIRECTOR
Tetsuya Mariko, known for his unflinching portrayals of violence and emotional strain in contemporary Japan, first gained international attention with his debut Yellow Kid, a student project that won the Dragon & Tiger Award at the Vancouver International Film Festival. He followed that with Destruction Babies (Locarno, Kinema Junpo, Yokohama Film Festival) and Miyamoto, which garnered the NETPAC Award for Best Screenplay and domestic praise for Best Director.
With Dear Stranger, Mariko shifts his gaze to a diasporic setting while keeping the sharp emotional focus and stark realism he’s known for. The film reflects his evolving narrative style and deepening interest in cross-cultural production, shaped in part by his time as a visiting researcher at Harvard’s Reischauer Institute.
FESTIVAL NOTE
Dear Stranger marks another step in Mariko’s expanding global trajectory. This is his second international co-production in recent years, following Coyote. Though centered around domestic silence, the film captures how disconnection can echo across languages and countries—especially when families carry secrets far from home.
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