Only Yesterday

Legendary animators Hayao Miyazaki and Isao Takahata team up to create this nostalgic animated work aimed at adult women, based on a manga by Yuko Tone and Kei Okamoto. The film centers on Taeko, a 27-year-old office worker who is sick of her job and ready for a change. She suddenly recalls the year 1966, when she was young and full of hope. She ventures to rural Yamagata prefecture to visit her sister and her brother-in-law. There she helps with the family farm where they turn saffron flowers into pigment for lipstick. While there she meets a hunky young farmer who's the cousin of her brother-in-law. She is immediately taken with his hard-working, salt-of-the-earth ways.

Beginning November 11, 1918, when President Woodrow Wilson declared the end of World War I in a letter to the American public, and continuing through his defeat, Prohibition, the Big Red Scare, the rise of women’s hemlines, and the stock market crash of 1929, Only Yesterday, published just two years after the crash, chronicles a decade like no other. Allen, who witnessed firsthand the events he describes, immerses you in the era of flappers, speakeasies, and early radio, making you feel like part of history as it unfolds.

A 27-year-old office worker travels to the countryside while reminiscing about her childhood in Tôkyô.

A 27-year-old office worker travels to the countryside while reminiscing about her childhood in Tôkyô.