It
is tough enough being a kid, but the family twelve-year-old-ish Tomo keeps
supplying fresh complications. Even though she is used to it, Tomo is still confused
and resentful when her unstable mother abandons her yet again. Initially, she
also has a hard time getting her head around her uncle’s transgender
girlfriend, but when the unconventional couple takes her in, she starts to
respond to the secure and loving home they provide in Naoko Ogigami’s Close-Knit (trailer here), which screens
during the 2017 Japanese Film Festival of San Francisco.
Tomo’s
mother has done this before, but never for this long. Makio tries not to judge
her too harshly, because he knows how hard their mother treated her when they
were growing up. Before, it was harder for him to put-up Tomo in his Spartan
bachelor pad, but his flat is now quite homey thanks to his live-in girlfriend
Rinko. Sensing the young girl’s bewilderment, Rinko explains she was born male,
but is in the late stage of transitioning, saving the more specific detail for
later.
Having
witnessed the bullying of Kai, a closeted classmate, Tomo is rather standoffish
at first. However, Rinko’s warmth and smiley face bentos quickly win her over. Soon
she is even teaching Tomo how to use knitting as an anger management tool (and
thereby establishing the dual meaning of the title). Tomo’s relationship with
Rinko also helps her relate to Kai with greater compassionate. Unfortunately, Kai’s
shrewish mother Naomi remains rigidly repressive.
In
case we missed the point, Ogigami contrasts the judgmental environment Naomi
creates, with flashbacks to Rinko’s years as a boy in middle school, when she received
from amazing support and understanding from her tough but cool mother Fumiko.
Frankly, the entire Kai subplot could certainly be accused of driving its
points into the ground and halfway to Timbuktu. However, Ogigami and the first
readers of her script probably felt it was necessary, so Rinko’s relationship with
her mother would not be dismissed as uncharacteristically and unrealistically positive
and accepting. Unfortunately, that makes poor little Kai the film’s whipping
boy.
Regardless
of the LGBT themes, young Rinka Kakihara gives a remarkably accomplished
performance as Tomo. She sure-footedly covers a wide emotional gambit. When we
watch her, we are keenly aware Close-Knit
is more than a social issue drama and Tomo has more going on in her life
than campaigning for transgender rights. She also has an enormously problematic
relationship with her mother, whose absence is still very painful.
Obviously,
a lot of attention will understandably focus on Toma Ikuta’s portrayal of
Rinko. He is very good as her, completely eschewing all cheap clichés and
contrived flamboyances. As he plays Rinko, she is just a woman working to find
her place in the world, who thinks she may have found a focal point for her
motherly instincts in Tomo. Misako Tanaka is wonderfully tart-tongued as
Fumiko, but Kenta Kiritani is likely to be unfairly looked for his appealingly
humane and understated work as Uncle Makio.
So,
we were saying something about the Japanese film industry’s aptitude for
domestic dramas. As it happens, Close-Knit
is considered a bit of a departure from Ogigami’s previous female empowerment
comedies, like the low-key but charming Rent-a-Cat,
but it is dramatically and stylistically quite compatible with films like Miwa
Nishikawa’s The Long Excuse and
Kore-eda’s After the Storm. Of
course, the sexual orientation themes are not accidental, which would make Close-Knit a heck of a shrewd
choice for Japan to submit for best foreign language Oscar consideration. (As
far as we can tell, it easily fulfills the language and release date
requirements, but you never know what the Academy quibble over.) Regardless, it
is a very nice film about a little girl, her uncle, and perhaps her future aunt
doing their best in a messy world. Recommended for those who would appreciate
either as a family story or a quiet transgender message movie, Close-Knit screens this Friday (9/8), as
part of this year’s JFFSF.
