1997: Suzaku (aka 萌の朱雀) (56th)

What else happened this year? Princess Diana died in the back of a limousine. The world went fucking mad. I was living in New Zealand as a particularly awkward adolescent, and was amazed by how much it impacted people on the other side of the world.

What is the plot - in one sentence? We follow a family living in a remote, mountainous Japanese village over time.

I don't have time, just spoil it for me? We first see them looking forward to a new train-line which will bring some modernity and ease to the valley they live in. We cut to 15 years later, and it hasn't arrived, to the disappointment of most in the valley, and the father of the family in particular - he'd seemingly relied on a job on the railway. The family has the parents, his mother (ie the grandmother) their daughter, and a slightly older-than-her cousin. 

By the end of the movie, the father has died / commit suicide, the mother and daughter go to live with her family, and the remaining two perform rituals and look to move closer to where the cousin works. The house is about to be empty, as many others around the valley are implied to be too. Throughout it is interspersed with footage of villagers, seemingly taken by the father before his death.

What is the meaning of the title? I don't know. I even looked it up. It's not the family name, the region, the town, anything like that. It seems like it's a family name. But it isn't their family name, so who knows? Further study suggests that it's the name of the god of the south of Japan... but are they even in the south of Japan? There's no indication that's where they are, I'll just move on and chalk this one up to 'not sure.' 

This bridge appears a lot in the movie. I love how lush the Japanese summer looks. I've also given up trying to write witty things under these pictures.

Anything that's not aged well? Does a woman get slapped around? No one gets slapped around! It's a miracle, the closest we come is when the boy cousin is playing around with the girl cousin and he pretends to punch her. He's just mucking around though. The fact that she's in love with him is potentially worrying, but we can excuse that as a crush.

Any thoughts? The mother takes a job in a hotel where the cousin works (i.e. that cousin is her nephew), and this movie uses that very movie-only trope of 'the mother coughs once, that is enough to show she has medical problems' and sure enough she faints while at work. That fainting seems to spur on her desire to move nearer to her own family. This trope ignores the fact that most people, including my own mother, cough constantly and don't faint.

I suppose the turning point of the movie is the death / suicide of the father, but the whole thing is shot distantly enough, and with enough time passing that it isn't so dramatic, it's just another feature of their lives. We realise that the town itself and the family inside it, will have to move on or die, and that's what happens. It's also hinted at happening all around the valley. 

I knew that nothing was going to happen, and was very content with that. I was then surprised that it had as much going on as it did. It's a slice of life movie, but at an important part of their lives. 

Would you recommend this? The scenery was beautiful, and summery shots are nice and relatively relaxed even with scenes which were ominous. There's also some nice, and interesting footage of people who were obviously locals to where they were filming. This was a very personal seeming movie, and definitely worth a watch. 

Final thoughts? The movie starts off with an introduction to the family, and then it cuts to them 15 years later. In the earlier section, the older boy cousin is slavishly devoted to the toddler-aged cousin, which is then mirrored with her being 'in love' with him when they are older. This is a type of love that seems to involve a lot of waiting in the rain for him to pick her up, quick moood swings and jealousy from her), anbd then a few kind moments together at a festival and on the rooftop... but anyway, the boy cousin is meant to be about 13 or so in the earlier flashback, and if the kid playing him is straight, I'm sober.* 

It seems that the movie was played by a few part time actors and a couple who seem to have made a career in it. The father, for example, is familiar from a lot of Takashi Miike movies, and is more recently known from the Wailing [spoiler alert] - he's the Japanese guy who is a demon and is bothering the Korean village. Interesting side note, every Japanese person I know who has told me about that movie has said it is very racist against Japanese people, and I can't argue with them really.

56 down, only a certain amount to go. Here are the others.

*not that there's anything wrong with that.