JFFSF ’17: Close-Knit

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.

JFFSF ’17: My Dad and Mr. Ito

Ozu films might look gloriously old fashioned, but it is still relatively commonplace for three generations to live under the same roof in Japan. Such will be the case when thirtysomething Aya Yamanaka reluctantly allows her seventy-something father to move in on short notice. Much to Old Man Yamanaka’s surprise, the third generation will be represented by her fifty-something boyfriend, Yasaki Ito. Things are sure to get awkward, but the real issues of their father-daughter relationship predate their current living conditions in Yuki Tanada’s My Dad and Mr. Ito (trailer here), which screens during the 2017 Japanese Film Festival of San Francisco.

Ito-san is an older, goofy cat, who is always called Ito-san, sort of like Tora-san, except he actually got the girl. Yamanaka met Ito-san when they were both working at a ghastly convenience store. For reasons she still has trouble putting into words, Aya discovered she enjoyed his company. He now works as a part-time school maintenance man is she is full-time at a bookstore. They do not have loads of money, but they were happier than most people.

In contrast, old Yamanaka pushed his daughter-in-law to the brink of a nervous breakdown. He and his son eventually agreed he would move in with Aya before they knew Ito-san existed. Yet, despite his trepidations, Ito-san probably gets along with the Yamanaka patriarch better than the grown siblings. This shaggy-looking quinquagenarian might be a little eccentric, but he is highly perceptive and emotionally mature, so he subtly pushes Yamanaka and her brother to work out their issues with their father while they still can.

The Japanese film industry invented the yakuza and kaiju movies, but they still hold an overwhelming comparative and competitive advantage when it comes to domestic dramas. It started with Yasujiro Ozu and Yasujiro Shimazu, continued through the prolific output of Yoji Yamada and bubbles up here once again. Hinako Nakazawa’s adaptation of Hisako Kurosawa’s novel is wistfully sentimental at times, but it is also relentlessly honest and grounded. Life is messy in this film, so if you can get through it yourself and do little things here and there to help other get by, you are kind of heroic, like Ito-san.

Lily Franky never breaks a sweat exercising his acting muscles, but he is still terrific as Ito-san. It is a deceptively effortless performance that wears well over time. Likewise, he and Juri Ueno forge the laidback chemistry of not particularly passionate lovers, who are comfortable as a couple and more relaxed in their own skins when they are together. Ueno is never flashy, but she makes Aya a quietly resilient force to be reckoned with. Tatsuya Fuji is definitely playing a classic grouchy grandpa, but he keeps the shtick dialed down to virtually nil.

This film would probably be unwatchable if it were produced in Hollywood, but its Japanese sensibilities make it wonderfully graceful and wise. It is all very calm and understated, yet it constantly offers up small surprises, never quite zigging how we expect it to zag. Highly recommended, My Dad and Mr. Ito screens this coming Thursday (9/7), as part of this year’s JFFSF.

JFFSF ’17: Love and Goodbye and Hawaii

In a way, breaking up is also a form of commitment, because it will most likely close one set of doors pretty definitely. Rinko and Isamu are not sure they are ready for that. They called it quits six months ago, but they are still happily living together. Obviously, this situation is not sustainable. When Isamu finally starts to hesitantly explore a relationship with another woman, it prompts great soul-searching on Rinko’s part in Shingo Matsumura’s Love and Goodbye and Hawaii (trailer here), which screens during the 2017 Japanese Film Festival of San Francisco.

Rinko the office worker and Isamu the grad student are quite civilized about their break-up. They had been living in his apartment, but given the cost of rent in Tokyo and Rinko’s desire to save money for a friend’s destination wedding in Hawaii, he quite reasonably let her stay on as a roommate. For a while, this works out quite well. They still speed-walk together and eat out at restaurants, but since they no longer have relationship stuff to worry about, they no longer fight.

At least, that is how things were for a while. When Kasumi, a pretty grad student starts showing and interest in Isamu and he starts reciprocating, Rinko feels threatened and inadvertently starts picking fights again. Before long, the atmosphere gets so tense, she must finally move out, but she only has a friend’s couch to temporarily crash on. As she deals with her near-homelessness and the heartaches of her friend’s younger sister (and co-couch crasher), Rinko finally faces up to her feelings and decides whether or not she will fight for Isamu.

Love etc is a deceptively simple but distinctly Japanese movie. It is sort of what we might expect if Hirokazu Kore-eda rewrote and remade a sappy break-up rom-com like Forgetting Sarah Marshall or the Vince Vaughn vehicle, The Break-Up. It is a quiet film, but its emotions get rather messy and they will not necessarily be resolved to everyone’s satisfaction.

In fact, this is quite an unequal movie relationship, with Rinko getting considerably more screen time than Isamu. She also seems to have more complicated feelings and Aya Ayano expresses them all with delicately subtle shadings. She makes all of Rinko’s flaws painfully clear, but we can also see why she is so hard to break-up with. In contrast, Kentaro Tamura is rather workmanlike as Isamu, but he has some nice moments expressing his passion for Japanese literature. However, one of the film’s surprise pleasures is Momoka Ayukawa, giving the film a slightly goofy, slightly saucy heart as the somewhat romantically-challenged sister of Rinko’s friend.

Matsumura captures the cool, crispness of early spring in suburban Tokyo, while the expressive songs of YeYe (a singer-songwriter known for accompanying herself on multiple instruments via overdubbing) further recalls the vibe of Kore-eda films like Still Walking. It is an exquisitely sad and lovely film. Very highly recommended, Love and Goodbye and Hawaii screens Sunday afternoon (9/3) as part of this year’s JFFSF, which is offering a slate of really high quality films, including Rage, Bakuman, The Projects, Tokyo Night Sky is Always the Densest Shade of Blue, Napping Princess (a.k.a. Ancien and the Magic Tablet), and Your Name.