HD trailer for Departures (Okuribito) up on Yahoo! Movies—I mean Apple Trailers

Thanks to logboy for pointing out that Yahoo! Movies now has the HD trailer for Yojiro Takita’s Departures (Okuribito), winner of the 2009 Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.

Regent Releasing has already screened the film at a few festivals and will be releasing it to the rest of the US starting on May 29, 2009. For the schedule, see this link. Here is their official synopsis:

DEPARTURES is a delightful journey into the heartland of Japan as well an astonishingly beautiful look at a sacred part of Japan’s cultural heritage.

“Departures” follows Daigo Kobayashi (Masahiro Motoki), a devoted cellist in an orchestra that has just been dissolved and who is suddenly left without a job. Daigo decides to move back to his old hometown with his wife to look for work and start over. He answers a classified ad entitled “Departures” thinking it is an advertisement for a travel agency only to discover that the job is actually for a “Nokanshi” or “encoffineer,” a funeral professional who prepares deceased bodies for burial and entry into the next life. While his wife and others despise the job, Daigo takes a certain pride in his work and begins to perfect the art of “Nokanshi,” acting as a gentle gatekeeper between life and death, between the departed and the family of the departed. The film follows his profound and sometimes comical journey with death as he uncovers the wonder, joy and meaning of life and living.

Update: Change of plans… Yahoo! Movies apparently took the trailer offline since last night, but it’s now available on Apple’s Trailer site in splendiferous HD. Clicky!

Here’s the standard def h.264 version, courtesy of Regent Releasing:

• 
  US Trailer - Departures (2008) [English-subtitled]
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