Small, Slow But Steady

2022 1h 39m JA

👍

6.9

SOLID

★6.9TMDB · 61

Drama

Synopsis

Spoiler shield

Keiko surprises everyone when she overcomes adversity to win her first two boxing fights. But when an unexpected incident threatens the closure of her gym, she is pushed further than she thought possible.

“Some stories are better left unspoiled.”

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Cast

Yukino Kishii
Keiko Ogawa
Tomokazu Miura
Katsumi Sasaki
Masaki Miura
Makoto Hayashi
Shinichiro Matsuura
Shintaro Matsumoto
Himi Sato
Seiji Ogawa
Hiroko Nakajima
Kiyomi Ogawa
Nobuko Sendo
Chiharu Sasaki
Nana Nakahara
Hana

Credits

Behind the camera

Director: Sho Miyake
Writers: Sho Miyake, Masaaki Sakai
Languages: Japanese
Countries: France, Japan

Want more? Switch to Cinephile mode in the header for DP, composer, budget, box office, production companies, keywords, and release history.

Did you know?

Fun facts 🍿

1 / 7

ERA

Did you know

Released 4 years ago.

MoodPlayr · trivia#01

2 / 7

WORLD

Did you know

International production across 2 countries: France, Japan.

MoodPlayr · trivia#02

3 / 7

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Directed by Sho Miyake, shot by Yuta Tsukinaga. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.

MoodPlayr · trivia#03

4 / 7

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Editor Keiko Okawa shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.

MoodPlayr · trivia#04

5 / 7

CAST

Did you know

Yukino Kishii and Tomokazu Miura and Masaki Miura carry the top of the cast.

MoodPlayr · trivia#05

6 / 7

WILD

Did you know

IMDB entry: tt17309864 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.

MoodPlayr · trivia#06

7 / 7

WILD

Did you know

Only 61 TMDB ratings — you're getting ahead of the curve on this one.

MoodPlayr · trivia#07

Cinephile deep dive

The take

Sho Miyake directs. Yuta Tsukinaga behind the camera. Keiko Okawa cuts. Runs lean at under 100 minutes. Produced in France, Japan. Dialogue in Japanese.

Trivia

Things worth knowing

1Released 4 years ago.
2International production across 2 countries: France, Japan.
3Directed by Sho Miyake, shot by Yuta Tsukinaga. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.
4Editor Keiko Okawa shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.
5Yukino Kishii and Tomokazu Miura and Masaki Miura carry the top of the cast.
6IMDB entry: tt17309864 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.
7Only 61 TMDB ratings — you're getting ahead of the curve on this one.
8Classified under 10 themes, including "loss of eyesight", "based on novel or book", "coming of age", "tokyo, japan".

The technical file

Cinematography: Yuta Tsukinaga
Editing: Keiko Okawa
Production design: Shinpei Inoue
Costume design: Nami Shinozuka
Makeup / hair: Shihomi Mochizuki
Sound: Takamitsu Kawai
Runtime: 99 min · 1h 39m
Status: Released
Original language: JA
IMDB: Small, Slow But Steady (2022)

Also by

Sho Miyake

Trailers & featurettes

Watch the pieces

Community reviews

What people are saying

CinemaSerf2025-09-19
★ 7/10
The deaf young “Keiko” (Yukino Kishii) has been taking comfort from her boxing since she was a child and already has two competitive bouts under her belt. With a constant stream of urban racket surrounding her, she lives in a world of silence where her only sounds are those imaginary ones created within her head. With her next competition looming, she learns that change is coming. Her fiercest critic; long-term supporter and ageing boss of her soon to close down gym (Tomokazu Miura) is suffering from failing health and as he loses his sight she must reconcile that she is to lose that oasis that has sustained and inspired her for so long. “Keiko” is not without her demons, and now facing some profound changes to her established routine, she must try to come to terms with her previous decisions and with how they should (or shouldn’t) shape her future. This is set at a time when COVID was rampant, so her abilities to lip-read are curtailed by the mask-wearing population rendering her even more isolated amidst a community who see no visible impairment and so leap to ill-informed judgements about a woman whose abilities to express herself in the more conventional methods are restricted - and Kishii delivers a really quite poignant performance here. Her characterisation of a woman confident, after a fashion, only in the ring but otherwise cutting a shy and almost reticent figure in the real world is touching - but not sentimentally. You can empathise with the difficulties of her efforts to thrive in a world where her disability sets her apart, but I never felt sorry for her. She has a decency to her that she is loathe to compromise despite her limiting options and her dead-end job as a cleaner is not going to be her future. As she seeks out a new place to train we discover that she is not a woman to be willingly constrained by any sense of “comfort zone” and with some intimate photography throughout, we get a slight sense of being under her skin just as she begins to engagingly get under ours. It’s a slow burn, and it’s an incomplete documentary-style look at this crossroads in her life - but I found that just added to the authenticity as her story continues unfolds before us revealing elements of her tenacity and showcasing societal attitudes that are complicated.

Production companies