TOUCH (Snerting)

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Storyline (warning: spoilers)

A romantic and thrilling story that spans several decades and continents; Touch follows one man's emotional journey to find his first love who disappeared 50 years ago, before his time runs out.
The bulk of the action occurs in flashback, as an old man named Kristófer (Egill Ólafsson) reflects on the days he spent in England in the late 1960s, as a student at the London School of Economics. It’s the heyday of the Vietnam protests and a militant student movement. Due to his left-wing beliefs, the young Kristófer (the director’s son, Palmi Kormákur) finds himself increasingly at odds with his more conservative friends from Iceland, and decides – on the spur of the moment – to drop out and take a job. They are standing in Soho, in front of a Japanese restaurant with a sign saying a dishwasher is wanted. Kristófer applies for the post, and the story begins.
Working for the restaurant owner, Takahashi (Masahiro Motoki), he becomes fascinated with Japanese culture and begins to learn the language. His greatest interest, however, is in Takahashi’s daughter, Miko (played by model and songwriter, Kōki). Little by little a romance develops, although it has to be kept a secret from her father. Takahashi-san is a possessive parent with plenty of secrets of his own, who is unwilling to say much about the family’s life in Japan, or how he lost his wife.
Back in the present day, the elderly Kristófer has had a disturbing diagnosis, and may not have long to live. Already a widower, he decides to close his restaurant and go in search of Miko, his long-lost love object. This will take him first to London, then Japan. Just to complicate matters, he’s travelling in the middle of the pandemic, having to negotiate lockdowns that make him the last person staying in his London hotel or flying on a near-empty plane.