I Am What I Am

Screening as part of the Japan Foundation Touring Film Programme 2026. This title of this year's programme is Knowing Me, Knowing You: The True Self in Japanese Cinema. 

If you book three or more films in the Japan Foundation Touring Film Programme 2026, each ticket will be discounted to the special price of £8. Simply add the tickets to your basket and the offer will be applied at check-out.

A liberating celebration of a woman who faces herself and chooses to live against Japan’s social norms.

Thirty-year-old Sobata Kasumi (Miura Toko) works at a call centre and lives at home with her family. Frustrated in her dream of becoming a classic musician and constantly pestered by her worrisome mother, who is desperate to see her married, Kasumi feels adrift. Unable to express how she truly feels, she even reluctantly attends an omiai — an arranged marriage interview — to satisfy her mother’s desire to find her a suitor.

The reality is, however, that Kasumi cannot harbour romantic feelings for men, and she would much rather pursue her other passions than conform to the expected path of marriage.

She changes careers to become a nursery teacher and, surrounded by her friends, embarks on a quest to confront what she truly wants, challenging traditional ideals of love and womanhood.

Against a context where romance holds a supreme position in Japan, I Am What I Am questions the need for love and marriage, celebrating simply being oneself.

Image: (c) 2022 "I am what I am" film partners