Teaser For Hirokazu Kore-eda’s Likely Cannes-Bound ‘Monster’

Back in August, I had mentioned that Hirokazu Kore-eda had wrapped production on a new movie. The Japanese filmmaker made it official in Tokyo on Friday and even gave us a title: “Monster”. No plot details were revealed. Here’s the teaser.

The Japanese release date of June 3rd, 2023 sets up a potential world premiere in May at Cannes, where Kore-eda has been a mainstay. In fact, he returned to Cannes this past May with “Broker,” which garnered mixed-to-positive reviews from critics. This was his first film there since his 2018 Palme d’Or winner “Shoplifters,” but it was shot in Korean. “Monster” is his first Japanese film since his Palme winner.

“Shoplifters” ended up grossing $3.3 million in the U.S, and $69.4 million abroad, for a worldwide total of $72.7 million (I’m sure its budget couldn’t have been more than a million dollars). Regardless, this was the “I told you so!” moment for Kore-eda’s fans, many of whom have been praising the 57-year-old director’s works since his 1995 breakthrough “Maborosi”

Kore-eda is no spring chicken, he’s been in the game now for almost 30 years, releasing well-regarded films such as “After Life,” “Still Walking,” “Like Father Like Son” and “After the Storm,” but he never truly hit the big time until that surprise Palme d’Or win.

This is the part of the article where I slyly post my always-updated Cannes predictions. I took off Ari Aster’s “Beau is Afraid,” which now has an April release date. When Berlin announces its lineup (next week?) a few of these might show up there and will thus be taken out:

Martin Scorsese’s “Killers of the Flower Moon”
Wes Anderson’s “Asteroid City”
Jonathan Glazer’s “The Zone of Interest”
Yorgos Lanthimos’ “Poor Things”
Woody Allen’s “WASP22”
Steve McQueen’s “Blitz”
Todd Haynes’ “May/December”
Alexander Payne’s “The Holdovers”
Jeff Nichols’ “The Bikeriders”
Bertrand Bonnello’s “The Beast”
Lynne Ramsay’s “Stone and Mattress”
Sofia Coppola’s “Priscilla”
Alice Rohrwacher’s “La Chimera”
Nuri Bilge Ceylan’s “On Barren Weeds”
Sean Durkin’s “The Iron Claw”
Michel Franco’s “Memory”
Roman Polanski’s “The Palace”
Matteo Garrone’s “The Captain”
Ken Loach’s “The Old Oak”
Aki Kaurismaki’s “Fallen Leaves”
Jean-Luc Godard’s “Scenario”/“Funny Wars”
Hirokazu Kore-eda’s “Monster”
Lisandro Alonso’s “Eureka”
Catherine Breillat’s “Last Summer”
Bruno Dumont’s “The Empire”
Abdherrane Sissako’s “The Perfumed Hill”
Justine Triet’s “Anatomy of a Fall”
Robin Campillo’s “École de l'air”
Maiwenn’s “La Favorite”
Nanni Moretti’s “Il sol dell'avvenire”
Marco Bellocchio’s “La Conversione”
Jessica Hausner’s “Club Zero”
Radu Jude’s “Do Not Expect too Much of the End …”