A Pale View of the Hills

In this compelling adaptation of Kazuo Ishiguro’s novel of the same name, director Kei Ishikawa portrays the life of Etsuko, who recounts her experiences in post-war Nagasaki to her youngest daughter. A Pale View of Hills unfolds as a film of two halves, shifting between past and present. It is a moving story about the generational impact of war and the tragedy it inflicts on a single family.

The novel was Ishiguro’s 1982 debut, long before he received the Nobel Prize in Literature. Although the author himself has noted that he wrote the book at just 25 years old, and does not consider it his strongest work, he has also observed that cinema has “a long history of bad books making for wonderful films.”
Ishiguro was born in Nagasaki, like his protagonist, and moved to England at a young age. His bicultural upbringing has given him a distinctive perspective that resonates throughout his work.

Director Ishikawa gained international recognition in 2022 with ‘A Man’, another literary adaptation. He was the one who first approached Ishiguro about bringing ‘A Pale View of Hills’ to the screen.

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