Written by Andreas Babiolakis

Warning: This review is for Look Back, which is a film presented at the 2026 Toronto International Film Festival. There may be slight spoilers present. Reader discretion is advised.

Image courtesy of the Toronto International film Festival.

Hirokazu Kore-eda has had a busy 2026, seeing as he has accomplished one of those rare double-feature years. A few months ago, we had his science fiction drama Sheep in the Box which was oddly disappointing by Kore-eda's standards (especially since it was his first film since Monster — a film that is more of the Japanese auteur's qualitative standards). After Sheep in the Box is now Look Back, which I am happy to say is a stronger effort (even with its enormous shoes to fill). Based on the acclaimed manga by Tatsuki Fujimoto, Kore-eda's film also has the highly celebrated animated film to be compared to. Even though Kore-eda's answer is not quite as monumental as these two previous works, his blend of the powerful source material and his signature slice-of-life storytelling makes for a screening that will both make and break your day; I would argue that this means that his Look Back is strong enough.

A semi-autobiographical look at Fujimoto's life as an artist (and his own spin on what a specific crisis felt like, without spoiling), Kore-eda turns Look Back into something more rooted in reality than an artistic interpretation like both the manga and anime feature film. We start in the younger years of student Fujino (played by both Furi Nanase and Natsuki Deguchi) — a budding manga superstar whose work gets featured and passed around her school on a weekly basis. It doesn't take long for her art to get compared to that of Kyomoto (Rokka Okada, and Aju Makita): a younger student whose drawings make Fujino second guess her abilities (and encouraging her to double down on her work ethic). Kyomoto is a recluse who never comes out of her room due to her crippling anxiety, and so she could be anybody; Fujino still tries to improve and be the top artist of the school. After some time has passed, Fujino is tasked with delivering Kyomoto her diploma for graduating her grade. It is this eventual meeting where it is revealed that Kyomoto isn't some defiant artistic mastermind: she is actually Fujino's greatest fan who has felt inspired by the latter to get better. The two form a mighty bond as best friends and manga obsessives. Fujino sees a friend to share her passion with, while Kyomoto finds strength with Fujino (she can not only now leave her room, she can even explore the world one step at a time).

Kore-eda's recognizable brand of wholesome, life-affirming cinema is on full display for the first two thirds of Look Back, and the transition from the years of friendly competition to complete devotion is effortless. Fujino and Kyomoto age together, finding out their strengths as individuals and as a pair. Fujino works on characters and story, while Kyomoto's inventive approach to art makes her the expert on backgrounds and panels with a heavy focus on intricate details. Together, they start submitting their work to a competition, and this is only the beginning of their success. Next comes the gradual escalation of fame once our dynamic duo reach adulthood — all the way to an ongoing series (Shark Kick, which was inspired by Fujimoto's successful Chainsaw Man when he worked on his original Look Back). However, it is at this moment that Kyomoto and Fujino drift apart. They view art differently. Fujino wants to keep impressing others and seeing how high her ceiling is. Meanwhile, Kyomoto as a more personal reason for wanting to take on art, and her growing appreciation for the works of Studio Ghibli indicate this.

Then comes the final act, which I won't touch on here so as to not spoil (but anyone familiar with the other Look Back releases will already know what is coming). When I first saw Kore-eda's Look Back, this turn knocked me back in my seat. Upon further reflection, I am not sure if this change of tone was handled quite as smoothly as the bridge between acts one and two. A major reason why for me is because the manga and anime film already feel like heightened versions of themselves (at least in ways) — when Kore-eda simmers things down to a humanistic drama, that third act comes in like, well, a shark kick to the face; it's one thing for a film to nail the sentiment that life can toss the unexpected at you, but it's another when it feels even slightly uneven. Nevertheless, once that pivot point pops in, it is Kore-eda who also saves the day for the film. He handles the aftermath far more strongly because he maintains the emotionally dramatic epicentre enough that everything rings true in Look Back, even when the film almost fumbles.

Now, if Kore-eda made Look Back only a straight-forward drama outside of this turning point, it would stick out even more in a negative way. Well, I am pleased that Kore-eda leaves his most fascinating ideas for last — from a "what if" dream scenario that walloped me like the ending of Damien Chazelle's La La Land, to the placement of us inside the mind of our two young dreamers (this animated sequence is extraordinary). Unlike the start of the third act (which felt effective upon my first watch but didn't sit well with me afterward), what Kore-eda pulls off in these moments echoed in my mind for all of the right reasons: these are the inner thoughts of a creative prodigy who is having to deal with extreme trauma and grief, and Kore-eda rendered these daydreams exquisite. I will say that the final shot — without giving it away — works well enough, but it isn't quite as effective as the manga and animated feature when you consider that these are drawn (so the cyclical nature of the story hits harder than the assumed bridge in Kore-eda's take).

Even with these minor hiccups, Kore-eda's Look Back mainly succeeds as a faithful, tender, and sentimental adaptation. It understands what art means for different visionaries. For Fujino, art is a way of discovering what she is capable of and a means of exploring what life has to offer (as she keeps reinventing her zenith). For Kyomoto, art is a way of savouring what life means to her and why we keep going every day (including using paintings of nature and cityscapes as her own "photographs" to snapshot her memories spent with Fujino). For Kore-eda, art is a way of connecting us all. His films touch upon common ground between all of us while also introducing events and occurrences that many of us have never lived — in the end, we are all still the same. Whether we are an illustrator finding it difficult to put pencil to paper again, a filmmaker trying to go back to the storyboard, or a film critic trying to find the words to describe a motion picture, we keep going because it's what we know best. In jubilation, in tribulation, and in indifference. In the face of artificial intelligence and its threat to decimate all that is creative, are these little acts of defiance not amazing? This is what makes us human: our different ways of inching forward when we are knocked back kilometres by misfortune. We truly are magnificent, and both Fujimoto and Kore-eda never forgot.

Andreas Babiolakis has a Masters degree in Film and Photography Preservation and Collections Management from Toronto Metropolitan University, as well as a Bachelors degree in Cinema Studies from York University. His favourite times of year are the Criterion Collection flash sales and the annual Toronto International Film Festival.