A few days ago I decided to go and see Nishikido Ryo’s new movie “Kencho Omotenashi Ka”. I had seen some of the previews and had listened to the theme song (sung by Kanjani8) and I had a little bit of an idea of what it was going to be about.

Basically, this movie revolves around the Kochi Prefecture’s (one of the 47 prefectures of Japan) newly reestablished hospitality department、which is the title of the movie 「県庁おもてなし課」, basically translating to “Prefectural Office Hospitality Department”. The job of the department is to promote tourism in the Kochi prefecture and the movie revolves around Ryo’s character, Kakemizu Fumitaka, trying to recruit a famous author, who was born and raised in Kochi, to help promote Kochi for tourism. Instead of doing that, the author tells Ryo’s character to go to another person, Kiyoto Kazumasa, instead. it is soon realized Kazumasa had been forced to leave the Kochi Prefecture office previously for controversial ideas. The rest of the story revolves around the conflit of bringing Kazumasa on as an advisor to the hospitality department, with a little bit of subtle romance, and some other conflict along the way. Actress Hirokita Maki also is in the movie and plays a semi-main character, the part time worker in the Hospitality department, Myoujin Taki.

All in all, I thought this was a cute movie! It was heartwarming, and the point of the movie, I thought, was realizing the love you have for the place that you were born in and scenery that can only be seen in a certain place. Because of this, Kanjani8’s theme song 「ここしかない景色」”koko shikanai keshiki” (translated to “Scenery only here”) is a perfect theme song for this movie. The only parts that were bad, in my opinion, were some of the fly-by and scenic scenes were a bit too fast and kinda blurry and shaky at some points. I thought the acting was amazing and that the script was well written. The story flowed well and there weren’t too many slow parts or fillers. I would recommend people to see this movie if they are in the mood for a light hearted, pick me up kind of movie!