We have grown numb to the little things in life. And, if it is almost impossible to regain that connection in big bustling cities, films like the Japanese Little Forest, which feel like actual hymns to the slice-of-life subgenre, can definitely do the trick!

Jun’ichi Mori’s Little Forest: Summer/Autumn (2014) and Winter/Spring (2015) are a two-part Japanese adaptation of a manga series by Daisuke Igarashi. The series, specifically the first part Summer/Autumn that I’m reviewing here, tells the story of Ichiko (Ai Hashimoto), a young woman who moves back to her childhood home in Komori (Little Forest), “a small settlement in a village somewhere in the Tohoku region,” and spends her time cooking from scratch, farming, and reconnecting to both nature and her story – even though she states Komori is just an escape for her.

The story is narrated from the perspective of Ichiko through her voiceovers, as each film is divided into two parts/seasons, and each season – into seven chapters as seven dishes Ichiko makes. The whole film is like a live cookbook with aesthetically pleasing instruction scenes, while also occasionally adding layers of complex storylines, such as Ichiko’s and other characters’ backstories, or her mother’s disappearance.

The film opens with a beautiful wide shot of Komori’s green fields, enveloped in mist. It’s an area where people mostly farm and/or buy products from the supermarkets in the neighboring town, as their shops are only in the village center, which is still hard to get to. Ichiko lives alone, in perfect harmony with nature, surrounded with forest and streams, unbothered.

Summer’s first dish is home-baked bread. The close-ups of Ichiko’s hands kneading it alternate with those of her face, showing sweat running down her neck. At this moment, and all the others to come, one thought hits the audience: this is not just some aesthetic movie about cooking; it shows realness; raw emotions, hard work that are paired with the tranquility that comes from working with your hands and enjoying the gifts God has given us  – something today’s “lifestyle” videos online (that try to imitate slice-of-life movies so bad but fail miserably) lack so much.

This realness becomes a recurring theme throughout all dish-chapters of the movie: rice sours; silverberry jam; Ichiko’s mom’s version of the worcestershire sauce – which Ichiko was sure was her mother’s invention until finding the real thing in the store – the same as the hazelnut spread ‘nutera’ her mother “invented,” that turned out to be a homemade version of Nutella; various dishes made from mizu collected around the streams in the forest; cooked tomatoes stored in jars. In a word, a gastronomic experience through the screen.

All throughout this experience, the audience also encounters Kikko (Mayu Matsuoka) and Yuuta (Takahiro Miura), Ichiko’s friends and their stories, as well as flashbacks from Ichiko’s childhood and teenage years learning to cook and farm from her mom. The movie is a slow-burn. Sometimes dreadfully so compared to today’s blockbusters and “productive” storylines. But that’s its whole beauty! The speed of the events progressing in this movie are directly proportional to how long (and how much effort) it takes to make each dish. Little by little, the audience gets infected by the patience Ichiko cultivates, carefully tending to her harvest and not growing weary from crafting joy out of food.

The shots of her cooking alternate with filler shots of the nature in Komori – sometimes in breathtaking wide shots, and sometimes – close-ups of rice plants or bees collecting pollen, which is contrasted by the indoor scenes – mostly medium shots of the kitchen, perfectly minimalistic, the CD player and the wired phone in the background creating a nostalgic feeling, decorated with the sunlight dancing among the pots and pans.

The second part of this first film, Autumn, has the same vibe, but the storyline deepens, and questions and hints about certain life events start subtly being answered. This season also brings a variety of mouthwatering dishes, accompanied by Ichiko’s detailed voice-over explanations – from sowing to harvesting produce, the recipes of dishes, and “kitchen hacks.” Believe me, it is all much more cinematic than how I described it. Akebi fruit eating techniques and its skin subuji style sauteed with veggies and spices; walnut-rice from scratch; nanbanzuka from trout; candied chestnuts; dried satsumaimo and satoimo potatoes; fried aigamo duckling meat; sauteed greens – the ones Ichiko struggles so hard until she gets them quite like her mom – all of these become part of the autumnal month charm.

After all, cooking is one of the most powerful universal languages. And, for Ichiko, it becomes a way to process her mom’s disappearance and their relationship, as well as better appreciate her culinary efforts. This character and storyline development alone make this film far deeper than it seems at first, and a true love letter to the slice-of-life subgenre.

P.S. As the film ends with Ichiko finally getting a handwritten letter from her mom, the Little Forest: Winter/Spring (2015) continuation promises to dive deeper into their relationship, fill the gaps of not only their story but that of the side characters, and, hopefully, offer a resolution as peacefully melancholic, as the film itself.