<\/p>\n I was just as impressed with \u201cRiver\u201d when I watched it again on Prime Video<\/a>, and it\u2019s the kind of cozy, playful movie that is ideal to revisit. If you aren\u2019t familiar with this hidden sci-fi gem, it\u2019s a breezy way to spend less than 90 minutes, and it deserves a place at the top of your watchlist.<\/p>\n You may like<\/p>\n What is \u2018River\u2019 about?<\/p>\n The movie\u2019s time loop takes hold at a rustic inn in the rural Japanese village of Kibune, where the staff is busy tending to the needs of the guests. Main character Mikoto (Riko Fujitani) pauses for a moment next to the river that runs alongside the hotel, then hurries back inside to help a co-worker clean up a dining room. They engage in some small talk about their personal lives and a breaking news story, and Mikoto then suddenly finds herself standing beside the river again.<\/p>\n RIVER OFFICIAL TRAILER (2023) FrightFest – YouTube Watch On <\/a><\/p>\n It doesn\u2019t take long for everyone at the inn to determine that they\u2019re caught in a two-minute loop, and they\u2019re remarkably practical about the unexpected development. The first several iterations involve Mikoto and her co-workers placating the guests, dealing with the time loop in the same manner as they\u2019d deal with any inconvenience, like a power outage or snowstorm. There\u2019s plenty of dry comedy in watching the employees explain why one guest can never get the soap out of his hair and another pair of guests can never finish eating their rice.<\/p>\n As the loops continue, the characters attempt to work out a solution to their dilemma, while Mikoto also works through her romantic feelings for shy cook Taku (Y\u016bki Torigoe). Each two-minute sequence is presented as a single unbroken take, but the technical proficiency never distracts from the storytelling. The eventual explanation is as upbeat and goofy as the preceding small-scale interpersonal drama.<\/p>\n Why you should stream \u2018River\u2019 on Prime Video<\/p>\n At first, it might seem like dozens of two-minute loops would get old, but \u201cRiver\u201d remains clever and engaging throughout its relatively brief running time. Yamaguchi does an excellent job of establishing the physical space of the inn, so it\u2019s easy to understand where everyone is at the beginning of each loop and how much effort it takes for them to meet up each time when they need to. The simple running gag of characters having to climb the same stairs over and over is one of the movie\u2019s most amusing bits.<\/p>\n While there\u2019s lots of light comedy in \u201cRiver,\u201d the filmmakers also find room for heartfelt emotion, both in the central romance and in the existential crises of the supporting characters. As a writer, I sympathize with the blocked novelist who\u2019s excited about the time loop because it means he doesn\u2019t have to worry about his deadlines. There are multiple entertaining arcs like that as the movie goes on.<\/p>\n There\u2019s a certain inherent optimism to time-loop movies, which are often about characters\u2019 capacity for positive change, and \u201cRiver\u201d captures that as well. It\u2019s a sweet, ingeniously constructed story about people making the best of a strange situation.<\/p>\n Stream \u201cRiver\u201d on Prime Video<\/a> now<\/p>\n Follow Tom’s Guide on Google News<\/a> and add us as a preferred source<\/a> to get our up-to-date news, analysis, and reviews in your feeds. Make sure to click the Follow button!<\/p>\n More From Tom’s Guide<\/p>\n Today’s best streaming service deals<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Time loops are one of my favorite sci-fi subgenres, so I was delighted to see that Japanese director…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":241506,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[96,2839,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-241505","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-entertainment","tag-movies","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/241505","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=241505"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/241505\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/241506"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=241505"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=241505"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=241505"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n![\"RIVER](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/1762181652_312_maxresdefault.jpg\")
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