It’s the tortured artist types you want to watch out for. Playwright Nagata (Kento Yamazaki), the protagonist of Isao Yukisada’s “Theatre: A Love Story,” seems to have been taking cues from Osamu Dazai, the godfather of nihilist literary posers. When he isn’t poring over handwritten manuscripts in vintage coffee shops, he’s either wasting time or getting wasted.
Never mind that evidence of his genius is in scant supply: He claims to be so thoroughly devoted to his art that he doesn’t need to trouble himself with things like paying rent, or extending the smallest kindness to his inexplicably long-suffering girlfriend, Saki (Mayu Matsuoka).
Japanese cinema is rich with such protagonists — invariably male, seldom interesting. But it’s fair to say that Nagata is a jerk, and your mileage with “Theatre: A Love Story” is likely to vary depending on how insufferable you find him.
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