Cherry Blossoms

Los Angeles Times Kevin Thomas

A stunning reminder of the omnipresence of mortality.

Christian Science Monitor Peter Rainer

Throughout the film there are small, rapturous moments.

Empire David Parkinson

Unpredictable and compelling, this draws parallels between Japanese and German cultures in interesting and moving ways.

The Hollywood Reporter Deborah Young

Doerrie goes beyond the "Lost in Translation" jokes about East-West culture clashes to communicate something meaningful and deep about Japanese art and thought.

Entertainment Weekly Adam Markovitz

There's a grace to it all, and moments of oddball poetry.

Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey

Both austere and garish, simultaneously dry and sentimental, tightly repressed and extravagantly expressive, bourgeois and bohemian. It's a seesaw, but Dorrie finds the balance.

San Francisco Chronicle Jonathan Curiel

The movie is an ideal blend of character study, deceptively simple plot twists, inspired acting, and travelogue.

Washington Post Ann Hornaday

Thanks to an accomplished cast, anchored by Elsner and Wepper, and observant filmmakers, very little in Cherry Blossoms is lost in translation.

Variety Eddie Cockrell

A successful novelist whose films bear the expansive plotting and telling character detail of the page, Doerrie never seems in any particular hurry to tell her tales, preferring the journey to the destination.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Noel Murray

There's something a little shallow about contrasting ungrateful German kids with their respectful Japanese counterparts and presuming the cultural differences are so cut-and-dried.

Boston Globe Ty Burr

It's a strained but heartfelt work of muted sentimentality, obvious in its symbolism but grounded in a sense of life's preciousness and brevity. Depending on your mood and indulgence, you may weep or you may be left out in the cold.

New York Daily News Elizabeth Weitzman

Refusing to be rushed, Doris Dörrie blends individual experiences with universal emotions to create a quietly moving study of self-discovery.

The New Yorker David Denby

The movie's conceits are just barely endurable, but the sharpness of Dörrie's eye--for Tokyo's electric night, for Fuji's iconographic landscapes, for cherry blossoms--sustains emotion even when story logic fails.

The New York Times A.O. Scott

While Ms. Dörrie’s film is exquisitely shot, its themes and metaphors are obvious rather than subtle, and its emotional rhythms -- rueful laughter punctuating the pathos -- would not be out of place in a television drama.

New York Post V.A. Musetto

At more than two hours, Cherry Blossoms could do with some pruning. And do husband and wife have to have rhyming names?

Village Voice Ella Taylor

The best I can say for Cherry Blossoms is that it's made with love; the worst, that it's been a big hit in Germany. Yearning for Ozu, Dörrie stops off at cute, and parks.