General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20264 min read

Our Little Sister (海街diary)

Our Little Sister (Japanese title: 海街diary, Umimachi Diary) is a 2015 Japanese family drama directed, written, and edited by Hirokazu Kore-eda, adapted from Akimi Yoshida's manga of the same name. It follows three adult sisters living in Kamakura who invite their teenage half-sister Suzu to live with them after the death of their estranged father.¹

Key fact	Detail
Original title	海街diary (Umimachi Diary), also translated as Tales from a Seaside Town¹^•²
Director	Hirokazu Kore-eda, who also wrote the screenplay and edited the film³
Source	Akimi Yoshida's manga, serialized in Shogakukan's Monthly Flowers; winner of the Manga Taishō 2013 and an Excellence Award at the 11th Japan Media Arts Festival¹^•⁴
Cast	Haruka Ayase (Sachi), Masami Nagasawa (Yoshino), Kaho (Chika), Suzu Hirose (Suzu)³
Release	June 13, 2015 in Japan (Toho, Gaga); July 8, 2016 in the United States (Sony Pictures Classics)⁵^•⁶
Cannes	Screened in Competition at the 2015 Cannes Film Festival; nominated for the Palme d'Or⁷^•⁸
Critical scores	Metascore 75 from 31 critics; 93% on the Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer from 120 reviews⁶^•⁹

Spoilers

Plot

Sachi, Yoshino, and Chika are three sisters in their twenties who share a large, old family house in the coastal town of Kamakura. Their father left home fifteen years earlier with another woman, and their mother later remarried and moved away; the grandmother who raised the three sisters has also died. News of the father's death reaches them, and at his funeral they meet Suzu, their shy junior-high-school half-sister, whose own mother has died and who has no comfortable place in her stepfamily. Sachi invites her to live in Kamakura, and the four begin a new life together in the old house.¹^•¹⁰

The sisters have distinct working lives: Sachi, the eldest at 29, is a nurse at the local hospital; Yoshino, 25, works at a bank and is promoted from teller to loan manager during the film; Chika, 21, works in a shoe shop. Suzu is 13 when she joins the household, which the sisters jokingly call an "adult dorm."²^•⁷

Production and adaptation

Kore-eda adapted Yoshida's long-running manga, which had been serialized in Monthly Flowers since 2006 and won the Manga Taishō 2013. The adaptation changes characters and story elements from the comic; in his Cannes festival statement, Kore-eda explained that he added conflict absent from the original, asking why none of the sisters bully their little half-sister in the graphic novel and noting that the story lacked elements such as Suzu running away from home after trouble with her older siblings.⁴^•¹¹^•¹²

Kore-eda also drew on research for the script, saying he interviewed women who were actual third or fourth sisters and reflected what he learned in the film.¹³ The film was produced by Fuji Television, Shogakukan, Toho, and Gaga, with production by FILM; music was composed by Yoko Kanno, and cinematography was by Mikiya Takimoto, who had also shot Kore-eda's Like Father, Like Son.¹^•¹¹

The film's length is listed as 126 minutes by Fuji TV and eiga.com, and as 128 minutes by WOWOW and the Cannes festival dossier.¹^•⁴^•³^•¹¹

Setting and style

The story is told largely from Suzu's point of view, with Kamakura's four seasons woven through the imagery: summer ocean light, autumn foliage, a tunnel of cherry blossoms, rain-season hydrangeas, and summer fireworks. Critics noted the film's episodic structure, reflecting its origin in monthly manga installments, and its visual control, including deep-focus compositions that reviewers compared to the style of Yasujiro Ozu.³^•²

Reception and awards

The film competed for the Palme d'Or at the 2015 Cannes Film Festival.⁸ At the 2016 Awards of the Japanese Academy it won Best Film, and Kore-eda won Best Director, with additional top awards for cinematography and lighting; the film also received 5 wins and 13 nominations at the Japanese Academy overall.¹²^•⁶ Suzu Hirose won the Hochi Film Award for Best New Talent in 2015 and the Kinema Junpo Best New Actress Award, while Kore-eda was named Best Japanese Director by Kinema Junpo readers.⁸^•¹⁴

Critical response was broadly favorable. The film holds a Metascore of 75 based on 31 reviews, classified as "generally favorable," and a 93% Tomatometer score on Rotten Tomatoes, whose critics consensus describes it as using "the story of one fractured family to offer universal -- and deeply moving -- observations on the human condition."⁶^•⁹ Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian called it quiet, understated, and gentle, presented with "wonderful freshness and clarity."¹⁵

Home media and availability

Blu-ray and DVD editions were released in Japan on December 16, 2015.¹⁶ In Japan the film is currently available on subscription services including Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, U-NEXT, and FOD.¹⁰

References

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026