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Title: Cottontail (2023) Director: Patrick Dickinson Writer: Patrick Dickinson Studio: WestEnd Films // Level 33 Entertainment IMDb Plot: A widower from Japan travels with his estranged son to England in order to fulfill his late wife’s dying wish. Joe Says: Cottontail is an exquisite entry in the oeuvre of modern day indie film.

Beauty can sometimes be found in sorrow. Writer/director Patrick Dickinson’s full-length debut, Cottontail, is indeed a sad tale of loss but the compelling characters within and their journey to fully reach acceptance is the epitome of a simple story told masterfully. Cottontail is an exquisite entry in the oeuvre of modern day indie film. 

Lily Franky plays Kenzaburo, a gray man whose bucket hat droops as if perpetually soggy. In the opening segment, Kenzaburo bumbles around in a half-drunken stupor on another rainy day in Tokyo. He drinks, he smokes, he shoplifts sushi. But Kenzaburo also remembers. Today is his anniversary and his bride has died. And Kenzaburo wishes to mourn.

Cottontail employs the well-used technique of mixing flashbacks into present day relevance. Cottontail’s editor, Andrew Jadavji, easily blends the two eras; while Kenzaburo’s present is heavy with rain, the past (acted by Kosei Kudo as Kenzaburo and Yuri Tsunematsu as the young Akiko) is gauzy bright and open with innocence. 

Akiko’s deathbed wish was to have her ashes spread at quiet Lake Windermere in England, where she once visited as a young girl. Kenzaburo and his estranged son and daughter-in-law make the trek to London. But Kenzaburo, neither patient nor accepting of his son (Ryô Nishikido), decides to head out to Lake Windermere solo. Soon, language barriers and unfamiliar territory has city-dwelling Kenzaburo turned around and lost in the rolling hills of northern England.

He finds shelter and comfort on a farm run by a father and daughter (played by real life father and daughter, the always-fantastic Ciarán Hinds and upcoming actress Aoife). Hinds’ famer, it is discovered, is also a widower. His eyes might be tired but he moves with quiet grace. His peace and momentary friendship brings comfort to Kenzaburo. 

Aside from the underlying reliance on the kindness of strangers theme, Cottontail is a quiet, masculine movie as Kenzaburo slowly, internally, processes. He remembers the good times with his wife, and the dark struggle of her early onset Alzheimer’s. Through it all, Kenzaburo’s heavy clouds of silence speak volumes. When he and his son reach the apogee of their relationship all on top of their loss, their screams come in the pouring rain. 

Dickinson keeps the narrative paramount. Sentimentalism is employed but is not spoiled.  Kenzaburo has a tale to tell and Lily-san’s body language is an open book. Each step might be painful but he continues ever forward. Cottontail is a beautiful testament of proof that spring eventually follows every winter.