WINNY

In this thrilling procedural based on true events, Masahiro Higashide (ASAKO I & II) plays real-life computer programmer Isamu Kaneko, inventor of the peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing program Winny, released in 2002. After Winny users are arrested for illegally uploading games and movies, Kaneko is apprehended by the Kyoto Prefectural Police department under dubious circumstances with the charged crime of intentionally “proliferating piracy” and abetting the violation of copyright laws. Recognizing the implication of Kaneko’s unjust arrest on Japan’s future computer engineers, Toshimitsu Dan (Takahiro Miura), a lawyer specializing in cybercrime, takes on the unprecedented case. Many have referred to WINNY as Japan''s THE SOCIAL NETWORK, Yusaku Matsumoto has directed a fantastic filmic narrative. Matsumoto smartly avoids the trap of overt melodrama so that actor Masahiro Higashide, who gained 18 kilograms for his role as the beleaguered programmer, can make the tragical finality of the narrative functional and effective with his performance. By delivering, first and foremost, a character study with the film, rather than a cut-and-dry courtroom procedural with a overly dramatic rhythm, Matsumoto offers a serene insight of altruistic invention versus the public''s malfeasance in using Winny for criminal activity, and the government''s perversity of law to fit their rubric, hence sabotaging the prospects of a new industry.