First Love

Japan, 2007
Length
96 minutes
Director
Imaizumi Koichi
Cast
  • Hiroshi Murakami
  • Teppen Matsunoki
  • Ryoya Kawashima
  • Shinji Horie
  • Kei Shibata
  • Kiyomi Ito

Content

Tadashi is about to take his final school examinations. Unbeknown to anyone, he has fallen in love with his fellow-pupil, Kota, and doesn’t dare to tell anyone. One hot summer’s day, some of the other schoolboys taunt him, calling him a ponce. This destroys all hope he ever had of getting together with Kota.
Thoroughly depressed, Tadashi meets a gay couple on the train. Hiroki and Sinji are fascinating; their conversation is so stimulating that, before he realises what he is doing, he decides to follow them.

It is completely irrelevant how old you are and how often it happens to you, falling in love is always just like the first time. In HATSU-KOI, director Imaizumi Koichi tells a story about coming of age, coming out and a gay marriage that is sprinkled with both love and hard-core sex, at the centre of which is a teenager who doesn’t yet know what he wants.

>>> watch trailer with Engl. subtitles on YouTube

Gallery

Credits

Production company
habakari-cinema+records (Imaizumi Koichi)
Original title
Hatsu-koi