Nagi Notes
| Release Date: TBA CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
77
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 11 Critic Reviews
Positive:
11
Mixed:
0
Negative:
0

Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
91
AwardsWatchMartin TsaiMay 15, 2026
The secret longings the characters have been carrying for one another are eventually disclosed with almost offhand casualness. By the film’s end, we know them with unusual intimacy. In any case, the revelations feel nearly incidental. Fukada is less interested in what these people have done than in who they are when left alone with themselves. Read full review
83
IndieWireDavid EhrlichMay 14, 2026
If Nagi Notes is so watchful and unforced that it often seems as though it isn’t looking for answers — or for anything — as hard as it should be, Fukada’s elegant plotting gradually allows this quiet film to assume the forcefulness of a full-throated shout. Read full review
70
IONCINEMA.comNicholas BellMay 14, 2026
Fukada is perhaps at his most elegantly demure as he juxtaposes two developing relationships rapidly progressing during one week in the titular rural area located in Okayama Prefecture. Read full review
70
Next Best PictureCody DericksMay 15, 2026
Koji Fukada’s lovely film offers up unobtrusive but valuable lessons on the importance of accepting one’s reality while not shying away from reaching for what’s desired. Read full review
70
Screen DailyWendy IdeMay 14, 2026
In its unassuming way, the film is a celebration of creativity and of emotional connections forged through art. But Nagi Notes is unassertive in its themes and, at times, gentle almost to a fault. Read full review
80
The Film VerdictDeborah YoungMay 14, 2026
Low-key but spanning a symphony of disturbing themes from personal relations and wildlife conservation to the threat of war, Koji Fukada’s ‘Nagi Notes’ offers a fascinating, multi-faceted perspective on insular Japan today. Read full review
80
The GuardianPeter BradshawMay 14, 2026
On the face of it, the film contains a soap-opera’s worth of secret feelings and tumultuous events, including the teenage lovers’ sensational escape from the town during a heavy storm. And yet Fukada maintains a cool distance. Read full review
80
The Hollywood ReporterLeslie FelperinMay 14, 2026
It’s such a seamless, harmoniously composed work, effortlessly edited and elegantly shot, that it’s almost too easy to just drift along with it, like floating down a river on a canoe, letting its currents take control. This isn’t a grabby, attention seeker of a film, but a quiet, watchful sort of movie that whispers its secrets sotto voce. Read full review
67
The PlaylistGregory EllwoodMay 15, 2026
This contemporary Japanese drama centers on the relationships between two vaguely thirtysomething women and two middle school-age boys. Two pairings that find a common connection in the most unexpected of circumstances. It’s the context of their attractions and the contradictions Fukada delicately presents that eventually beguile the viewer, even if his restrained aesthetic may test your patience getting there. Read full review
70
TheWrapChase HutchinsonMay 14, 2026
Much like the central sculptures that become the focal point of its best scenes, Kôji Fukada’s “Nagi Notes” is a film defined by a sense that the filmmaker is trying to chip away at something. Read full review
80
VarietyGuy LodgeMay 14, 2026
Nagi Notes, however, happily sees the director returning to the form of his 2016 breakout Harmonium, with the precision of its characterization and the balance between heartfelt emotional candor and pensive silence in its finely worked script. Read full review
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