‘Ha-Chan, Shake Your Booty!’ Elevated by Rinko Kikuchi’s Performance | TIFF 2026 Review
Within the first second of Josef Kubota Wladyka’s Ha-Chan, Shake Your Booty!, the American filmmaker of Polish and Japanese descent immediately grabs our attention with large (and maximalist) title cards that announce a boisterous theatrical event. Divided into six chapters (plus an epilogue), Wladyka follows a Japanese dancer named Haru (Rinko Kikuchi), who competes in ballroom competitions with her boyfriend Luis (Alejandro Edda).
A story about processing grief through the power of dance
After Luis dies during one of the aforementioned competitions, Haru is struck by inconsolable grief. She becomes isolated from her friends and family and loses interest in competing. But she is forced back into the studio and meets Fedir (Alberto Guerra), a dancer with whom Haru develops a close infatuation, despite his being married. The rest of the story occurs at the precipice of dreams and reality as the protagonist attempts to process her grief through the universal power of dance.
It’s a relatively crowd-pleasing story, primed to go gangbusters at a festival that specializes in crowd-pleasers. A story with big musical numbers that attempts to visualize how Haru overcomes grief, while she falls in love with someone she shouldn’t have a connection to… What’s not to love?
With I Play Rocky and Being Heumann, Ha-Chan, Shake Your Booty! seems to be yet another crowd-pleaser to end all crowd-pleasers at this year’s edition of TIFF, but it’s also the weakest one of the bunch, despite its assured style and incredible lead performance.
Rinko Kikuchi’s performance makes Ha-Chan, Shake Your Booty!
Really, the only reason why you should bother with Ha-Chan, Shake Your Booty! is Rinko Kikuchi. Her portrayal of Haru, at every turn, is filled with such palpable sadness that it’s hard not to root for her journey of redemption. It is the best performance of her career, worthy of all the praise she’s gotten since the film premiered at Sundance in January.
It’s difficult to portray grief in a way that feels so textured and deeply human, but the way Kikuchi represents Haru’s plight makes us feel for her, even when she puts herself in embarrassing (read: cringe-worthy) situations.
Wladyka’s visual style also bursts with confidence. Not a single frame in his movie feels decidedly singular, even if the film doesn’t go all in on maximalism. If you prime the audience with large title cards in both English and Japanese and continually show the country’s extreme entertainment culture on television, I half-expect the film to follow suit, even if it treads in dark subject matter.
Still, there’s enough creativity to overcome some of these aesthetic missteps, especially in a bravura dance choreography that blends balletic action with the rhythms of a Japanese cover of The Ronettes’ “Be My Baby.” It’s the film’s best sequence and the only one where the narrative doesn’t feel predictable in its emotional beats. If only Ha-Chan, Shake Your Booty! were less treacly, especially in its climax, where we can see everything coming a mile away and Kikuchi’s emotional intensity doesn’t land.
The supporting cast also can’t muster Haru’s deeply felt grief, even if Guerra’s presence is alluring enough to make us believe why the protagonist would be attracted to him. Wladyka sadly doesn’t go deep enough in the character study at the heart of the movie and instead wobbles between too many generic tonalities to make a tangible impact.
It is creative enough to inspire our imaginations, especially when the filmmaker frames dance (and creativity) as the ultimate catalyst for overcoming the grief we will all feel when we lose someone closest to us.
The final scene, where Haru dances to The Cranberries’ “Dreams” in a moving vehicle, perfectly captures the film’s central message. Dance is, after all, an expression (and reflection) of our current emotions. We sing when we can’t find the accurate words to convey what we mean, and we dance when nothing comes out of our mouths and we need a cathartic release.
Ha-Chan, Shake Your Booty! film rating and final thoughts
Ha-Chan, Shake Your Booty! accurately represents that cathartic release. It is a genuine crowd-pleaser that will hit all the right notes for anyone looking for a good time at the movies, but it might fade from memory as soon as it’s over. When I Play Rocky will likely have more staying power later this year, even if Peter Farrelly is not an aesthete, there’s a massive problem.
But at least Rinko Kikuchi continues to prove her talents, and there’s hope that the world will recognize them this time. She’s too brilliant an actor to fall by the wayside.
Ha-Chan, Shake Your Booty! releases in theaters on September 25, 2026.
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