Miso soup doesn't need a story, but this show gives you one anyway, and suddenly a bowl becomes the moment a mother stops being alone in her kitchen, or a son remembers home when he's too far away to taste it. These are commercials that refuse to sell you anything except the texture of ordinary life, the kind of tenderness you don't notice until it's framed for you. Animation this patient, this precise in its smallness, reminds you that the most important moments don't move fast.

A collection of short animated stories about the tender and bittersweet moments of everyday family life. The pieces were made as commercials for Marukome Co., Ltd., a company that produces miso soup paste. The fourteen shorts include episodes about a mother and her son, working away from home, a midnight snack, moving to Tokyo, becoming a mother, summer vacation memories, going home for the holidays, and a grandmother. The tone is gentle and quiet, in keeping with its slice of life label.