Locked Out (ロックアウト Rokku Auto)

“‘Locked Out” pulls me in deep into the breath of its life. I tremble watching this film.” - actress Amanda Plummer

CANADIAN PREMIERE

A six year-old boy getting lost in a shopping mall parking lot is any mother’s worst nightmare, but a six-year-old accidentally getting into the car of a stranger’s car with a bloody pick axe in the trunk is the stuff of horror movies. That’s exactly what happens to little Keita (Takeru Shimada) in Locked Out, but director Yasunobu Takahashi plays with our expectations almost immediately. Yes, this stranger, Hiroshi (Kiichi Sonobe), has a pick axe in the trunk of his car and is haunted by a violent, demonic doppelgänger, but is he a psychotic killer or a lost soul on the highway of life? As the film unfolds we slowly begin to piece together what set Hiroshi off on his journey in the first place.

Locked Out has screened at the 2009 Yubari International Fantastic Film Festival, the 2009 Nippon Connection Japanese Film Festival and the 2009 Barcelona Asian Film Festival, amongst many other festival stops around the globe. Director and writer Yasunobu Takahashi deftly mixes equal parts edge-of-your-seat psychological thriller and life affirming road movie in this truly unique film.

Director: Yasunobu Takahashi

Producer: Yasunobu Takahashi

Screenplay: Yasunobu Takahashi

Cinematogrpahy: Tetsuya Takahashi

Editing: Yasunobu Takahashi

Music: Katsuhito Teshirogi

Cast: Kiichi Sonobe, Takeru Shimada, Miho Ogata, Tomomi Miyashita, Noboru Akima, Hiroh Suzuki, Hiroyuki Yamamoto, Yutaka Ohnuki, Keisaku Kimura

Released: 2008

Running time: 82 min.

Trailer / Official Website

Director’s Bio

Born in 1974 Yasunobu Takahashi traveled to the United Stated in 1995 to study filmmaking at Cupertino, California’s De Anza College. After spending a year and a half in San Jose he returned to Japan where he worked as an assistant director on a number of productions. Honing his skills making seven short films Takahashi combined all his filmmaking experience in his debut feature film Locked Out.