ALL ABOUT LILY CHOU-CHOU
aka RIRI SHUSHU NO SUBETE

Year: 2001
USA: Cowboy Pictures
UK: ICA Projects
Cast: Hayato Ichihara, Shûgo Oshinar, Yû Aoi, Ayumi Ito, Takao Osawa, Tomohiro Kaku
Director: Shunji Iwai
Country: Japan
Language: Japanese (English subtitles)
USA & UK: 146 mins
UK Certificate: 15 contains strong language and sex references, and bullying themes
USA Release Date: 12 July 2002 (Limited Release - Los Angeles and New York)
UK Release Date: 30 August 2002

Synopsis

Yuichi is in the 8 th grade and he lives with his mother, her boyfriend and his son in a rural town. At school he gets bullied and abused but in those suffocating school days, his favorite singer, Lily Chou-Chou was all that mattered to him.

At home he keeps to his room all day long and finds his release in the Lily Chou-Chou's fan site 'Lili-philia', which he manages - it's the only place for him. One day 'philia' (Yuichi's handle name at fan site) encounters another passionate Lily fan, 'blue cat' in the site who becomes his close friend.

A year ago in 1991 when Yuichi Hasumi (Hayato Ichihara)was 13 he didn't know Lily. It's a happy period in his young life. He's just entered junior high and one of his classmates is Hoshino, who was a model student scoring high marks. Yuichi goes out of his way to strike up a friendship with him, and seizes the opportunity when both join the Kendo/Japanese Fencing club. They joined the final summer training camp, but exhausted from it and decide to plan a trip to Okinawa.

They take off for the island and all goes well at the beginning, but things takes a turn for the worse when Hoshino almost drowns. Soon after, they witness a bloody traffic accident. The trip appears to trigger dark changes ahead.

The new term begins with classmates looking older.