Hope Message 2

The message of KANEBO’s new movie is “Feel the Power of Hope.” KANEBO believes that, if every one of you expresses your feelings and becomes who you truly want to be without being bound by biased values of beauty and stereotypes, the world will change. We hope that cosmetics encourages you to be yourself. When you feel an impulse to stay true to yourself that comes from deep within you, cosmetics can be one of the tools to freely express who you want to be. Through applying cosmetics, each one of you will be able to cross the boundaries by breaking down the stereotypes that hold you back and to let your uniqueness bloom as you wish. KANEBO hopes to support a society where everyone celebrates their own uniqueness and lights up their lives with hope.

KANEBO’s new movie captures moments of people with different ages, nationalities and genders wearing makeup in front of a mirror, including Sena Nakajima, a fashion model who has been appearing in the brand’s movies since 2020. The movie features lively expressions of people enjoying wearing lipstick and eyeshadow while looking into a bathroom mirror, sitting in front of a studio’s mirrored wall, seeing a reflection in a car window, looking in a traffic mirror, and directing a smartphone’s camera toward themselves. It delivers uplifting feelings created by self-expression and also portrays how they live their lives as who they are. In this documentary-style movie, each of the cast members picked up costumes that represented themselves and also wore their favorite makeup, so that the movie could bring out their natural expressions, not acting. The movie is full of beautiful moments that captures people’s expressions shining in front of a mirror.

The artwork, designed by Pawel Nolbert, a graphic artist, features a fluid into which many colors blended, representing that all the differences and boundaries in people and concepts melt away. The artwork appears in mirrors and also in the last scene of the movie.

The song played in the movie, “You’re More Beautiful Than a Rose”, was originally released in January 1979 and used for Kanebo Cosmetics’ spring promotion in that year, achieving a great popularity. After over 40 years from the release, the song has been arranged in tune with the new message. The new version with orchestral arrangement is majestic and invigorating, representing excitement and uplifting feelings for expressing and changing to our desired selves. The song was covered by Keita Tachibana, who is a vocalist, engineer and producer, who is highly popular in Japan and overseas. His delicate yet powerful voice represents KANEBO’s message in the song.