Sixteen-year-old Ami (Mihaya Shirata) is a Singaporean teen haunted by the echoes of the mysterious disappearance of her mother in the wake of the cataclysmic tsunami that tore through eastern Asia in 2011. Her dreams torment her leading her to seek answers from her father who initially acts very cagey and emotionally shut down. He eventually relents though and allows her to travel to Japan in search of answers where she meets up with her downbeat uncle Isamu (Masatoshi Nagase). The two set off on a journey through the still damaged landscape of Japan to uncover what really happened to her mother.

Last Shadow at First Light is not an easy film to get a grip on. The pacing is glacial and the imagery is both hauntingly beautiful while also being at times frustratingly enigmatic. The slow cinema approach and the tendency to blend abstract supernaturalism with grounded naturalistic scenes and performances (Shirata’s in particular is excellent) reminded me at times of the films of Apichatpong Weerasethakul and even Andrei Tarkovsky. Director Nicole Midori Woodford favors long static shots that reveal hints of what has happened in small breadcrumbs around the margins while lingering on small and seemingly insignificant details. For those needing a film to make perfect sense and wrap up everything in a tight little bow by the end, Last Shadow at First Light‘s inscrutable imagery may be a turn off. But the film has a mood that if experienced in the right mindset may worm itself into your subconscious and provide a melancholy but meaningful film experience.

Indiepix has once again provided a worthy and beautifully photographed film in a slightly fuzzy 480p transfer that is about as good as one could expect of such a low resolution. Like previous Indiepix releases, I wish such nicely shot films as this could receive a proper blu-ray release, but it could certainly be a lot worse. The 2.0 Stereo audio track is nice and clean with no noticeable distortion and is able to handle the quietness of the film without any significant hiss. The disc includes no extras save a brief Director’s Statement of intent on the back of the case.

While the technical specs could be better, if you are a physical media connoisseur, this DVD of Last Shadow at First Light is still better than nothing and captures a film all about grief and struggling with the aftermath of a vast tragedy with a nuanced and somewhat abstract touch that makes this film an easy recommendation for fans of slow cinema and arthouse films in particular.