ロンドンに暮らす精神科医のヘクターは、完璧な恋人にも恵まれ、何不自由ない生活を送っていた。ところが、同じように満たされているはずの患者たちの不満や悩みを聞き続けているうちに、自分まで何が幸せか分からなくなってしまう。そこで、本当の幸せとは何かを世界中で調査しようと思い立ち、イギリスを飛び出して幸せ探しの旅を始めたヘクターだったが…。
The follow-up film to “Barstow, California” takes us to the mountains of Miyama, a remote forest and tourist area north of Kyoto. Uwe Walter, a shakuhachi player from Germany, lives there with his wife Mitsuyo for 30 years. Together with the villagers he prepares the annual Gion Festival. On the eve of the festival, the village representatives tell him that his self-built studio is to be demolished. This brings back memories for him of earlier times and his first steps as a Nō actor. In the manner of a fresco, the film interweaves rural depictions of everyday life with the story of its German protagonist. In the village community with its togetherness of generations, Uwe shares life with his neighbours, with farmers, hunters, woodsmen, poultry farmers and anglers, tills his kitchen garden, and like other tradition-conscious villagers, he also grows his rice. The film shows them in a harsh mountain landscape between the rainy season and the first snow.
After traveling the globe to highlight low-tech, Corentin de Chatelperron has set himself a new challenge: to live independently, alone for four months, on a bamboo raft floating in Phang Nga Bay, Thailand. On his 70 square meter platform, the engineer, passionate about ecology and system D, puts into practice what he has learned in order to feed himself and produce his own energy.