Throw together a nerdy guy with a superpower, a purehearted girl who falls for him and his best friend who’s been secretly in love with him since childhood, and you’ve got a typical setup for a love triangle, variations of which can be found in many a manga and movie. In Keiichi Kobayashi’s quirky rom-com “Love Is Light,” which was adapted from a manga series by the mononymous Akieda, this story plays out in ways fresh and charming, despite its familiarity. Wisely, the film focuses more on its protagonist's tortured personal journey than his predictable final destination. Formidably smart and excruciatingly polite, university student Saijo (Fuju Kamio) has an unusual intellectual interest: the definition of love, and not only in the dictionary sense. His curiosity stems from his mysterious ability (though he considers it a curse) to gauge feelings of love in the women around him by the tiny globules of light they emit. But what, he wonders, does this light really mean? Mere sexual attraction or something more? His confidante is Kitashiro (Nanase Nishino), a childhood friend who calls him by the nickname “Sensei” (“Professor”). Though she has carried a torch for him since their elementary school days, she is resigned to permanent friend status — and never emits a single light bubble. Then one day, Saijo meets Shinonome (Yuna Taira), a girl in his college class as earnest and unworldly as he is. At Saijo’s suggestion, the new friends begin exchanging a diary in which they inscribe their thoughts on the knotty problem of love. We soon see that the pair are a perfect couple, especially after Shinonome innocently confesses her affection for Saijo and light begins to gently dance around her. But just as love is about to bloom, Yadorigi (Fumika Baba), a classic mean girl who specializes in stealing the boyfriends of other women, targets Saijo as her next conquest. Kobayashi has been scripting and directing offbeat films themed on love and populated with likable oddball characters since his feature debut “About the Pink Sky,” which received the best picture award in the Japanese Eyes section at the Tokyo International Film Festival in 2012. In “Love Is Light,” however, Saijo and Shinonome are so out of the flesh-and-blood ordinary that it’s hard to imagine them as anything but minds and spirits intertwining. Also, Kitashiro is too forbearing as the hero’s best pal, though Nishino plays her with nuance and sharp comic timing. Baba’s portrayal of Yadorigi, as she insouciantly elbows her way into the film’s romantic triangle, refreshingly defies the “designing woman” stereotype. Some of her lines may be on-the-nose — while drinking with Saijo, she flatly confesses “I’m a predator” — but she is also bracingly matter-of-fact. “If you think it’s love, it is,” she proclaims to members of her clique. “Love is a battlefield,” she later tells the impressed Shinonome. In this sweet but all-too ethereal film, she is a funny and needed reality check. And, yes, those little balls of light bob around her, too. https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448624212028686342 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448628748529172487 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448630100252688388 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448632490888527876 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448633554874400768 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448635530785849352 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448636550387597320 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448638308522393600 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448639250621792257 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448640713318203396 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448641441424211971 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448643510038167552 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448644509339484169 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448646864290185216 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448648083716964357 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448650690678226948 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448652002237087745 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448653105926242306 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448654418021974024 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448655189304147975 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448656697819136008 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448657603419701253 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448659223150854149 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448660058001899528 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448661596103507969 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448663078680920072 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448663882544447493 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448664979489161223 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448665887396593665 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448667445437923336 https://community.oneplus.com/thread/1448668221266722819 https://bit.ly/3S8miBh https://bit.ly/3Qvlsxw https://bit.ly/48XUuFM https://bit.ly/473yB62 https://bit.ly/3ScfSBs https://bit.ly/46HtyIY https://bit.ly/3S6zOpb https://bit.ly/406MPkm https://bit.ly/472RtlP https://bit.ly/471lHWj https://bit.ly/3FvGiq6 https://bit.ly/3FuFWQs https://yamcode.com/oneplus-18 https://pastelink.net/3vfg2btr https://rentry.co/24z7v https://justpaste.it/b7d47 https://pasteio.com/xNTMuQZDlKsk https://pastebin.com/hsLzfLPP https://paiza.io/projects/g2Bl22FnbXMhSaSeIKN6Qw https://onlinegdb.com/gHrXEMkez https://paste2.org/yceZ794k https://paste.cutelyst.org/ee2yZ3dMR https://www.pastery.net/ryquev/ https://bitbin.it/rcCHJSOI/ https://controlc.com/3a7c2f8b https://paste.toolforge.org/view/7562fa4c https://gitlab.gnome.org/-/snippets/6227 https://notes.io/qQ2MP https://ctxt.io/2/AABQVY1DFA https://jsfiddle.net/keinzywr13/z8qempth/ https://telegra.ph/oneplus-10-24 https://ideone.com/2KmwCF https://pastebin.freeswitch.org/view/cc48e8b7 https://git.forum.ircam.fr/-/snippets/16274 https://linktr.ee/onepluss https://solo.to/onepluss https://about.me/webonline1