Eleven-year-old Fuki is curious about death. She writes fictional essays imagining her own funeral and occasionally attempts to communicate with spirits. For a young girl with a father battling cancer, death is not a distant concept, but rather a part of life and an area of curiosity and exploration. After envisioning a nearfuture Japanese society focused on the elderly in her previous film Plan 75 (2022), Hayakawa Chie has crafted a new work depicting 1980s Tokyo, examining the many forms death can take from a child’s perspective. Fuki observes the adult world that will one day be hers, sometimes imitating it, and cheerfully sensing the contours of this unknown territory. Life’s fragments steadily pile up on the girl’s clear, resolute face. Renoir is an impressive coming-of-age drama that loosely recalls the worlds of Somai Shinji. (MOON Juhwa)