Films about people with visual disabilities are typically about overcoming struggles — or triumphing in spite of them. In “Ray,” Ray Charles beats poverty and prejudice to become an R&B legend. In the “Zatoichi” series, the titular blind hero slices sighted opponents using his preternatural hearing to pick up the slightest motion.
Winner of the grand prix awards at the Tama New Wave and Tanabe Benkei film festivals, Ryo Onishi’s debut feature “Feelingscape” tells a compelling if slow-paced slice-of-life story about a man who has been blind since adolescence but is neither a role model nor superhero. Instead, Yoshinori Nishimura (Tomoki Kimura) works at a call center and lives alone in the small fishing port where he grew up. His passion is fishing: He soaks a line at every opportunity.
However, as played by Kimura, an accomplished veteran character actor with a mordant presence, Yoshinori is anything but average.