Katsuko Nakamura

An African immigrant living illegally in Belgium is desperate to find his own sense of belonging.

How do you bring together such different people as Odette Saint-Gilles, an aging, forgotten actress living in a welfare home, Augustin Dos Santos, a pool boy at the Ritz Hotel, Bettina Fleischer, the heroine of a popular soap, and Raphael, a young, disturbingly handsome man? Together, will they have a last chance to make their dreams come true?

Emma meets François at an airport in France. He is an astronomer who studies the phenomenon of black holes, and Emma finds herself immediately taken with him. Their romance flourishes during a stay in the countryside. But one day, François disappears on a bicycle ride. Left alone in a big house, Emma becomes afraid and returns to Paris to continue her life as a real estate agent. Soon after, François' brother Michel contacts her and together they try to solve the mystery of François' disappearance. But when he encounters Emma, Michel begins to transform into a ghost. Emma slowly begins to realize she possesses a frightening power that she was not aware of.

Japanese Yann Dedet's Land of the Singing Dog concerns a musicologist, Toyo Mahiru (Gen Shimaoka), and his wife, Yoshiko (Katsuo Nakamura), who travel to a remote French village because Toyo has heard there is a citizen of the village that owns a singing dog. As the childless pair humorously adjust to their new surroundings, they soon spend more time concentrating on conceiving than in searching for the talented canine. The subdued, reflective Land of the Singing Dog was screened as part of the Director's Fortnight at the 2002 Cannes Film Festival.