The Taste of Tea (Cha no aji)

THE TASTE OF TEA (Cha no aji)       A                    

Japan  (143 mi)  2004  d:  Katsuhito Ishii                    Official site

It's more cool than weird, and it stays in your head.

In something of a gentle homage to Japanese master Yasuhirô Ozu, Ishii has concocted one of the most original family dramas ever conceived on celluloid, though the story is simplicity itself.  Offering more a series of vignettes than a narrative, all this film does is follow a Japanese family around for awhile in their small mountain village surrounded by rice fields, allowing each one to explore their own individuality.  Style-wise, this is a brilliant screenplay and a hilariously inventive film, not afraid to use surreal, out of body experiences, or subtitled sections when no one is saying anything, films within the film, or brilliant animé imagery side by side with other kinds of colorful animation.  What works here is that these techniques are not just used for show, but they are essential in revealing character.  This film is such a joy to watch that you don’t even realize, until the end of the film, how well you have come to know each of the members of the Haruno family, something of an astonishing surprise.  Mood is essential, and each of the characters has their own carefully defined world, where collectively, through them, we are fascinated to learn about ourselves in the process, as it taps into places in our own subconscious where we’re not used to looking, where perhaps unintentionally, a prominent theme of the film is revealed when a character makes an off-the-cuff remark about the music they’re listening to, “It's more cool than weird, and it stays in your head.”

What’s perhaps most remarkable is the transformative use of the imagination that is nothing less than revitalizing, using surrealistic flourishes where a train comes out of Hajime’s (Takahiro Sato) forehead and flies off into the sky, expressed as a real train is taking his secret crush off into the distance without him, a high school girl he longs for but is terrified to speak to, where Hajime is seen pedaling his bike furiously through the rice fields, often shouting out to the heavens, or the hilarious use of 8-year old Sachiko’s (Maya Banno) growing annoyance at constantly seeing giant images of her head wherever she goes, often floating outside her classroom, hovering just outside the window, continuously interrupting her “real” life.  The pace of the film is perfect, as each sequence flows so effortlessly into the next, weaving in and out of everyone’s lives.  It’s a quiet yet jubilant evolution balancing comical moments with the meditative imagery of a river or of mountains or of a still moment.  While we might have some quibbles, and some may think perhaps this film is too cute, but this is how the film explores the interior worlds, with an unusually poignant visual flair, and we are never disappointed, where despite the length, the film is constantly reinventing itself.  Oddly, it would probably be appreciated just as much by children aged 8 and above, as there’s certainly something in it for everyone.  Ishii is known for the animation sequence in Tarantino’s KILL BILL VOL 1 (2003), but here he’s allowed the freedom to develop his own story, to just let it go and air out his imagination.

To its credit, the film doesn't have a "target" audience, as there isn't even a hint of commercialism, yet it's nationalistic to the core, where praising the small quirks or the individuality of the family is in the Ozu school of Japanese cinema, yet where Ozu simply observes ordinary life objectively, often without an ounce of sentimentality, this film focuses on the internal worlds of the rather eccentric (not dysfunctional) characters by allowing them to open up and soar through highly inventive animated techniques, to explore the limits of their imaginations without being condescending to the characters.  Ishii offers a wonderful perspective on aging while also celebrating the worth of elders to their families, such as the elderly grandpa (Tatsuya Gashuin), by recognizing their memories in a highly personal, yet uncustomary fashion, while at the same time celebrating the isolation of youth, where they feel left out and misunderstood, being the youngest (Sachiko), or from the first crush to adolescent detachment (Hajime).  The director also explores the mid-life crisis, where an absent uncle Ayano (Tadanobu Asano) returns after being away for years and searches for a lost love, while the mother (Satomi Tezuka) is stuck as a career professional, deciding instead to branch out on her own and attempt something artistic with her life, which may only be understood and appreciated by a small community of other artists.  In this family, through rich character development, everyone's point of view is explored and is equally valid, where the ultimately transcendent film becomes an expression of love by demonstrating that a tolerance of others is as significant as celebrating your own unique individuality, which is given such an unusual visual flourish that it is only minimally used, so as not to dominate the overall mood of the film, which focuses on the meditations of a quiet life in the country.   

I Wish (Kiseki)

I WISH (Kiseki)           B-                   

Japan  (128 mi)  2011  d:  Hirokazu Kore-eda

Not everything has to be significant.  Imagine if everything had meaning.  You would choke!

—Kenji (Jô Odagiri)

In a nod to Japanese masters like Ozu, with his fondness for trains and everyday, ordinary reality, also Naruse, with his fondness for family dramas facing the wrenching impact of the modern world, Hirokazu Kore-eda has written the simplest of children’s stories, also seemingly influenced by the spontaneity of the French New Wave, as these children can be seen running through the streets wherever they go, always running towards an elusive and indefinable goal of happiness.  Commissioned by the Japanese Railways as publicity for the Shinkansen Bullet Train connecting the northern and southern regions on the island of Kyushu, much of the story, accordingly, centers around trains, where families grow excited hearing about the idea of a bullet train linking the southern Japanese city of Kagoshima with northern Fukuoka, the homes of two real life brothers, Koichi (Kôki Maeda) and Ryu (Oshirô Maeda), each living with a different separated parent.  Kagoshima is directly across the bay from Sakurajima (seen here in 2009:  Full resolution), an active volcano spewing ash upon the city every day, where Koichi is regularly seen sweeping and wiping the ash away, and the town’s children, amusingly, have the ash beaten off of them, as one might a rug, each raising a cloud of dust before they enter the school.  Koichi may be in 5th grade and is the older, more brooding brother living with his mother and grandparents while the two years younger Ryu lives a more carefree life with his aimless and less ambitious father (Jô Odagiri), a would-be rock musician who can’t seem to hold a steady job and prefers instead to gamble.  Both have found a network of friends and seem to be happy, but Koichi secretly wishes his family would get back together again.  The film is told largely from Koichi’s point of view, but also adds the perspective of each of the other children.  Adults in this story are seen as distant, rarely part of the children’s world, where the grandparents tend to be eccentric, ever involved in drinking, playing cards, hula dancing, or finding the long sought after ingredients to a favorite recipe for a karukan cake.

There’s an interesting Japanese custom of announcing yourself each time you enter your home, also seen in Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s TOKYO SONATA (2008), where this familiar greeting has a way of paying respects and maintaining solidarity not only with your family, but also the dwelling itself.  Japanese families continue to fully accept modernization, complete with all the latest technology and advancements, but also maintain rituals that connect them to their pasts.  The modern landscape of busy city streets are always punctuated with those Ozo compositions of telephone wires strewn high above, as if linking civilization together, right alongside the passing trains.  The ominous cloud above the volcano looms everpresent, a suggestion of lurking danger, where Koichi is continually amazed how people just seem to ignore it.  Mostly the kids meet in secret, away from their parents, and discuss the world around them, including their favorite things and secret desires, where one of Koichi’s friends has a crush on the school librarian, who is ever cheerful and wears short skirts, others dream of being as good as Japanese baseball player Ichiro Suzuki.  In class, when asked what profession they might wish to pursue, several of the kids are clueless, as one wants to be in “exile,” while one of Koichi’s friends wants to be a rhinoceros beetle.  This kind of breezy, lighthearted comedy with enthusiastically happy kids describes the mood of the film, which feels like a series of often improvised vignettes strewn together.  When Koichi hears a rumor that the combustible energy of two bullet trains passing in opposite directions is so powerful that if you make a wish at the exact moment they pass, it comes true, this becomes the driving force of the film. 

The ever smiling Ryu, aware of the constant fighting when his parents were together, makes friends of his own, including a taller girl Megumi (Kyara Uchida), who aspires to be an actress in Tokyo, and is seen doing television commercials with another more ambitious girl in her class that seems to always get the lead.  Her still attractive mother, Kyoko (Yui Natsukawa), is a former actress, but left the profession to raise a child, still embittered by the fierce competition of the business, bluntly questioning if her daughter has what it takes, and now runs a local bar.  Like Ryu, she seems to want to get away to Tokyo largely to avoid the drunken customers of her mother's bar.  Koichi frequently chats on the cellphone with his brother and hatches a plan where they meet at the closest spot where the bullet trains cross paths, hoping they can make their wishes come true.  Believe it or not, a lot of planning is involved, from raising money for trainfare and for food, finding a way to get out of school, also away from their parents for an overnight experience, where they’d need a place to stay, as they couldn’t return until the next day.  For kids this young, this is a major undertaking, filled with any number of possibilities that could go wrong, but they’re always seen eagerly moving ahead full throttle, excited at what the future will bring, where it becomes a train road movie, a journey into the unknown, a child fantasia entering the Zone of Tarkovsky’s Stalker (1979), a place where one’s innermost desire can become true.  Unlike many of Kore-eda’s other movies, the haunting funereal poetry of MABOROSI (1995), the somber and delicate fantasy of AFTER LIFE (1998), the searing social realism of NOBODY KNOWS (2004), or the meticulous, unsentimentalized detail of STILL WALKING (2008), this is clearly on another plane, feeling very much like a real life animated movie that allows kids to be kids without the complex difficulties of having to encounter a hostile environment.  Family separation is not debilitating for these brothers, as both have a solid network of friends and feel loved by their extended family.  This coming of age story may feel too slight and without sufficient conflict for adults, really not all that inventive and not helped by the generic music from Quruli, where kids might enjoy this much more than adults, as they are the focus onscreen for nearly the entire adventure, though just spending time with these kids may be the point.  While not nearly as clever or imaginative as the gentle stylistic flourish of Naomi Kawase's SUZAKU (1997) or Katsuhito Ishii’s The Taste of Tea (Cha no aji) (2004), the future, as seen from their eyes, looks bright, where kids are resilient and strong with evolving values that reflect a flexible ability to adapt and change, retaining ever positive outlooks as they look ahead.

Bunny Drop (Usagi doroppu)

BUNNY DROP  (Usagi doroppu)            B                    

Japan  (115 mi)  2011  ‘Scope  d:  Sabu (Hiroyiki Tanaka)

Taking a page out of Takeshi Kitano’s endearing KIKUJIRO (1999), where an adorable young child hooks up with an improbable gangster yakuza on a road journey across Japan, where their diametrically opposite impulses keep the viewers on their toes and the film from sinking into familiar territory, Sabu on the other hand instead chooses a more formulaic style, a single man raising a child, told in a rather straightforward manner but then enhances the experience by for the most part avoiding cheap sentiment.  Once more, the centerpiece is an enchanting child, in this case 6-year old Rin (Mana Ashida), who resembles the daughter Sachiko (Maya Banno) in Katsuhito Ishii’s THE TASTE OF TEA (2004), noticeably off to the side with no one paying attention to her during a grandfather funeral service, where it turns out she is his illegitimate child.  Everyone is too involved with their own affairs to worry about this child, believing child services would eventually intervene—everyone, that is, except the deceased’s grandson, 30-year old Daikichi (Kenichi Matsuyama) who asks if the child would like to come home with him where he gets a quick refresher course on parenthood, knowing next to nothing, but stubbornly refusing the help from his sister (Mirei Kiritani) who indicated he would crack within a few days.  Adapted from a manga comic by Yumi Unita, the point of view is clever enough to include Rin’s views throughout the film, feeling very much like a Miyazaki children’s film, as Rin has to make her way through this terrifying experience virtually alone, where Daikichi is more of her sidekick than the other way around.  Rin is firmly the centerpiece of this film.   

What is clear from the outset is that the two are perfectly matched, as both are a bit mature for their age, but Daikichi’s refusal to patronize the young girl helps considerably, as they work as a team, where she offers him advice on parenting skills, which are needed, as he quickly finds a child care center, but it’s unnerving having to carry this new girl through rush hour commuter trains and the swarms of pedestrian foot traffic in order to eventually find a center which is nowhere near his job, where he has to sprint the entire way if he expects to make it to work on time.  It’s evident no one could keep up that hectic schedule, where he’s forced to transfer to a lower paying position in order to avoid the late night mandatory overtime, arriving much too late to pick up Rin.  It’s amusing to discover none of his original coworkers had children, but all of his new coworkers do, where they’re quick to compare photos of their kids.  But the heart of the film is the interpersonal relationship between Daikichi and Rin, as it’s a sweet and warmhearted duo, told realistically and intelligently, where they both earn every bit of love and affection that they offer and receive.  Rin, for instance, occasionally asks profound questions, developing a complex inner life of her own. 

The first variance from the tone of realism are Daikichi’s daydream sequences, where he sees gorgeous women in magazine photo shoots and instantly fantasizes dancing an ultra-sensual tango, where the two sizzle with sexual intoxication, which are delightfully amusing moments, nothing kinky about them, but adds a suave and debonair step to Daikichi’s character.  He’s no super parent, as his many mistakes only make him more endearing and vulnerable, where he’s helped along the way by another single mom (Karina, one of the dazzling women in his fantasies) whose son and Rin become fast friends.  They are apparently the only two kids at the childcare center without two parents, as they are deeply affected by an assignment to draw many different pictures of their two parents, which sends them bolting out the door on a journey alone through the city.  Reported missing, there is a frantic citywide search for them, which has a familiar tone with Miyazaki’s MY NEIGHBOR TOTORO (1988), especially the way the search brings everyone closer together, an effective use of unforced realism, where a child’s world is not patronized or embellished by cheap narrative tricks, but is fully captivating by the attention to small details that capsulizes what matters the most, where their whole world is present in these everyday moments, often enhanced by Masayuki Iwakura's quietly effective score.  One of the best sequences of the film is a parallel alternative to Daikichi’s fantasy sequences, a children’s theatrical spectacle where they’re all dressed up in costumes and where the universe of children couldn’t be more magical and alive.