Almost deceptively, Ryusuke Hamaguchi’s latest film initially comes across as a conventional story about a big, bad corporation invading a rustic village for profit. The simplicity of the premise is what works for me, since I love stories that explain in detail situations involving labor and commerce. Here we have a Tokyo talent agency exploiting COVID-related government subsidies to set up a rental campsite for rich Tokyoites in the mountains of Yamanashi, where the locals live in relative harmony with the land. As part of the subsidy deal the company has to gain the trust of these locals, who don’t go for the plan at all. For the most part, the plot development is unexceptional though punctuated by several dialogue-driven set pieces that prove Hamaguchi’s genius in creating tension through character interaction. Compared to Hamaguchi’s previous work, it’s forthrightly entertaining—that is, until the very end, when it goes bonkers in a way that would be impossible to describe even if I wanted to.
The “evil” referred to in the title does not exist in nature, whose relationship to humankind has no Manichean dimension. It just is, and whatever trouble humans cause for nature or vice versa is relative and, for what it’s worth, “natural.” The village handyman, Takumi (Hitoshi Omika), understands this relationship, and you can intuit his unvoiced resentment of the company’s two representatives, the veteran factotum, Takahashi (Ryuji Kosaka), and the conflicted novice, Mayuzumi (Ayaka Shibutani), in the way he rejects their offer of employment in the glamping enterprise. But just because Takumi identifies strongly with the natural world doesn’t mean he doesn’t harbor destructive impulses. One of the mysteries that Hamaguchi plays up in the film is the absence of Takumi’s wife, since he is raising his 8-year-old daughter, Hana (Ryo Nishikawa), by himself, teaching her how to address nature, which he sees as being red in tooth and claw. In contrast, the scenes in Tokyo at the talent agency virtually drip with mercenary bad faith, a kind of sickness that Takahashi and Mayuzumi sense after incurring the wrath of the villagers during their presentation and then, unwittingly, bringing that sickness back to the village on a subsequent revisit to secure the locals’ permission at their boss’s patronizing insistence. They choose Takumi as their means of delivery without realizing that their good intentions are anything but.
Hamaguchi’s purposes are aided considerably by Eiko Ishibashi’s haunting score, which tends to be used only in those dream-like scenes that take place in the woods, whereas the scenes set in so-called civilization move to a kind of dull utilitarian rhythm. It’s a contrast that Hamaguchi works up in a subliminal way, so that the turn of events is even more of a shock. It would be petty to accuse the director of trying to manipulate the viewer’s feelings, but after seeing it twice—the second time paying close attention to any clues that plumb Takumi’s personality—I still find it weird and scary. Don’t go into the forest unless you’re prepared for something you would never expect.
In Japanese. Now playing in Tokyo at Bunkamura Le Cinema Shibuya Miyashita (050-6875-5280).
While many people have opinions about director Jonathan Glazer’s allusion to the current state of affairs in Israel/Gaza at the recent Oscars ceremony, fewer have remarked on Mstyslav Chernov’s equally powerful remarks when he accepted the Best Feature Documenary award for 20 Days in Mariupol. Glazer, who received the best international feature Oscar for Zone of Interest, was conflating the attitude that birthed the Holocaust to the way the world is now tacitly accepting the wholesale killing of civilians in Gaza, a view that is divisive. Chernov, whose movie is about Russia’s indiscriminate killing of civilians in the Ukrainian port city of Mariupol at the start of Putin’s invasion last year, is not a filmmaker with a certain vistion, but rather a journalist, and so he is only interested in getting the truth out to the world, which is essentially what the movie is about. Right now, especially in the U.S., there is a difference of opinion as to whether Ukraine deserves to defeat its Russian invaders, but in any case Chernov’s footage shows that the atrocities are indisputable, and so those whose agenda is to somehow discredit Ukraine for whatever reason have nothing to say about the movie or Chernov’s chilling comment that he wished he had never had to make his film.
But he did have to make it, because that is his job. As a reporter for AP, Chernov and his video crew were in Mariupol when the invasion was launched, and he captures as closely as possible the violence visited on the residents of the city without really trying to determine their political stance, because all that matters during the 20 days recorded is survival, which is mostly a matter of luck. It’s clear that Russian planes and artillery are targeting civilian homes and public buildings, including hospitals (a preview of Gaza, as it were). This means Chernov and his crew are in as much danger as the people they are covering, and a good portion of the film is given over to the effort to just find a working signal to connect to the internet so that Chernov can send his footage to the outside world. Often he confronts people on the street who are fleeing from a bombed home or business. Sometimes they curse at him and call him a “whore,” but others understand: He has to show this to the world, so they talk to him and explain in horrifying detail the death or maiming of a loved one. Chernov shows the dead and mutilated bodies, which he doesn’t bother to edit—that will be done by the outside news media. “We keep filming,” he says during his typically hushed English narration, “and it just stays the same.” The carnage is especially distressing at a maternity hospital, where women are waiting to give birth. Many, along with their babies, die while doctors desperately try to save them.
As Chernov explains at one point, Russian media tried to dismiss the footage by saying it was somehow staged, and you have to laugh at this ridiculous attempt at subversion of the truth. By its very nature, 20 Days in Mariupol defies critical analysis because it simply reveals what is happening without trying to uncomplicate the chaotic circumstances behind its creation. By that token, it is exhausting to watch, visceral in the most direct way, despite Chernov’s efforts to make it all coherent as a linear record of a historical event in the making. He also tries to contextualize what we are seeing, but if, like me, you find it hard to concentrate on the logistical and political ramifications of the attack because you’re despairing over the images, it only means you are watching it the way it was intended to be watched. You should be horrified and outraged. No other responses are valid.
In English, Ukrainian and Russian. Opens April 26 in Tokyo at Toho Cinemas Nihonbashi (050-6868-5060), Toho Cinemas Hibiya (050-6868-5068), Toho Cinemas Shinjuku (050-6868-5063).
Given his prodigious output over a career that started in 1965, it should be surprising that director Marco Bellocchio doesn’t have more of an international following, but it may have something to do with the parochial nature of his work, which is not just thematically handcuffed to his native Italy but also appeals to a narrow sensibility that non-Italians may fail to appreciate. In recent years, however, he’s made attempts to explore Italian history more broadly, and while his storytelling tools still deliver overly large sentiments at the expense of narrative subtlety, for those of us who don’t know much about Italy as a national entity the films are quite educational.
With Kidnapped, Bellocchio explores an incident that marked a turning point in Italy’s development as a nation while also igniting the world’s scorn. In 1852, a son was born to a Jewish couple in Bologna, which at the time was under the direct rule of Pope Pius IX. The household maid, believing he was ill and might die, clandestinely baptized the boy, named Edgardo, so that his soul would not be banished to limbo. But the child did not die and the maid was subsequently fired for a different misdemeanor. When Edgardo was 6 a magistrate for the church arrived at the couple’s house and said that he was taking the boy to Rome to be raised as a Christian. His parents, Salomone (Fausto Russo Alesi) and Marianna (Barbara Ronchi), knew nothing about the maid’s subterfuge and, of course, objected mightily. The scene where Edgardo is taken away wailing while his parents put up a fight is the kind of thing Bellocchio was born to stage, with operatic music pounding away on the soundtrack and the camera following every outsized emotional gesture. Over the next hour or so, we see how Edgardo is indoctrinated into the Church while his parents try everything to secure his return, including writing letters to Israelite associations in foreign countries to help them gain public support. The matter becomes an international scandal, much to the chagrin of the Rome Jewish Council, since they have to deal with Pius (Paolo Pierobon) directly for their own needs, and the pressure from outside forces, including the global press, just makes the old megalomaniac more perverse in his determination to keep the boy at all costs. During this part of the movie Bellocchio plays the viewer’s emotions like a well-tuned violin, periodically suggesting the possibility of some kind of moral triumph before quashing it with another melodramatic set piece. Boo! Hiss!
Historically, much of the script sacrifices truth for dramatic convenience (at least according to Wikipedia), though the details—like, for instance, the Church’s sizable financial obligations to the Rothschilds, which constantly works to stir up the pope’s antisemitic rants—are endlessly fascinating. And I got lost at the end when the forces for Italian unity took over Bologna, since it wasn’t clear just what the Papal States lost except their regional political autonomy. Obviously, Italians already know about this, but Bellocchio doesn’t bother spelling it out for the rest of us. I guess I need to brush up on my 19th century European history.
In Italian, Latin and Hebrew. Opens April 26 in Tokyo at Human Trust Cinema Yurakucho (03-6259-8608), Shinjuku Cinema Qualite (03-3352-5645), Yebisu Garden Cinema (0570-783-715).
On March 22, Emperor Naruhito and Empress Masako visited victims of the New Year’s Day earthquake that struck the Noto Peninsula on the Japan Sea coast. It was the couple’s second visit to a disaster area since Naruhito ascended to the throne in 2019, but this time there was chatter online about why the royal couple had waited so long. Officially, they said they had held off the visit due to fears that their presence could complicate matters for locals, and they did donate funds to help those affected, but even in the Emperor’s birthday message to the nation, he did not specifically mention the victims, which some people felt was unusual.
This feeling was likely prompted by how differently Naruhito had approached the matter compared to his father, Akihito, who retired so that his son could take over. Akihito would have likely been more proactive in his response to the Noto quake. In 1991, for instance, one month after the Unzen volcano erupted, he visited the disaster site. He was in Kobe two weeks after the Hanshin Earthquake of 1995. He sent a special video message to the victims of the Great East Japan Earthquake in 2011 five days after it struck, and thereafter visited the affected area with his wife, MIchiko, 7 weeks in a row. Naruhito, on the other hand, didn’t even record a message to the Japanese people during the COVID pandemic.
According to Takeshi Hara, a political scientist who has written numerous books about the Emperor and the so-called Emperor System, the “Reiwa style” of Naruhito is shaping up to be very different from the “Heisei style” of his father. Hara sat for a lengthy interview with Asahi Shimbun that was published March 13—before Naruhito and Masako made their first visit to Noto—and he tried to summarize the contrast between the two emperors, but five years in Naruhito has not really established any kind of “style,” which is notable considering how hands-on his father was as a monarch.
Of course, activism is not part of the postwar Emperor’s job description. The Constitution defines his role as a “symbol” of the country, but doesn’t explain what that entails. Hara refers to Akihito’s 2016 message to the people where he implied his intention to step down. In the message, he mentioned the “challenges” of the two pillars of his symbolic role, which are “praying for the happiness of his subjects” and “standing beside them” as a figure of empathy. Hara interpreted this statement to mean that, in addition to the court rituals that the Emperor is required to carry out, Akihito felt it was his duty to comfort the people when troubles arose, as well as acknowledge the troubles of the past. This was something his father, Hirohito, the Showa Emperor, did not do, especially with regard to remembering the Pacific War for which many people hold him responsible. Akihito did remember the war, and made a point of visiting places closely associated with it.
That empathy, says Hara, is the key to the Heisei style. In comparison, the Showa style after the war was vague and ambiguous. It’s why Akihito felt he had to step down. He was becoming too old to effectively carry out what he considered his duties as the Emperor, even though there is no provision in the law to allow him to leave the throne before he dies. Akihito, as well as Michiko, felt that “fortifying” the symbolism of the imperial household required “hard work.” By that standard, Naruhito’s status is as unclear as his grandfather’s was, and Hara finds it strange that the present Emperor’s “stance” has not been criticized, which would seem to indicate that “the Japanese people are just losing interest in the Emperor.” The former Emperor was always a vivid presence, and, in fact, remains a more engaging figure in retirement than his son is while actually occupying the throne. Even the crown prince, Akishinomiya, attracts more attention than Naruhito due to his son, the only younger male heir in the royal family.
Wang Bing’s latest documentary may not, at 215 minutes, be one of his typically longer works, but it is probably his most vivid. He spent 6 years recording the lives of young textile workers in the city of Zhili and fashioned three films from the footage. Youth (Spring), itself the first of three movies about young Chinese workers, is reportedly the most narrative-attentive of the films that emerged from the footage, though it would be difficult to trace a continuing arc of a story. For the most part, Wang gathers together pieces of action that fit together thematically without necessarily relating to any other pieces of action. He will jump from concerted labor disputes to romantic intrigues to knock-down, drag-out fist fights, all filmed up-close and extremely personal. Though Wang’s epics can sometimes be a slog, this one rips right along thanks to the undeniable energy of the young people being studied. Though the labor is often punishing, these are not worker ants but fully expressive individuals with character and verve who dress well, love as heartily as they can, and make every attempt to enjoy themselves, even if it kills them. They occasionally enjoy their work, too, of which they are justifiably proud.
What’s immediately notable about Youth (Spring) is Wang’s lack of authorial judgment, which means even the ironies on display—the almost insistently bleak Zhili consists of nothing but sweatshops lined up on a street called Happiness Road—are downplayed. Some observers seem to have a problem with this in that Wang isn’t being as critical about the system as he should be, especially compared to previous work like Til Madness Do Us Part (about the state’s poor treatment for the mentally ill) and Dead Souls (about the murderous anti-intellectual purges of the 60s and 70s), but here he is less interested in the political ramifications of the topic he’s filming than in how the objects of his gaze present themselves from minute to minute. Though many have lazily compared Wang to Frederic Wiseman, Youth (Spring) is the first documentary I’ve seen by him that feels as obsessed with getting to the heart of institutional behavior as Wiseman’s movies are. The little dramas that play out in real time almost have a scripted quality because of the way Wang frames them without reference to other dramas. The aforementioned fight scene between two young men competing for two things at once (a promotion and the affections of another worker) is so viscerally striking that you almost assume it had to be choreographed, as the two combatants tumble over work benches and sewing machines to get at each others’ throats. An earlier competition between two other men who want to prove which of them is the fastest stitcher in the factory has a joyous texture as they show off their skills with theatrical flair. And when one employee discovers she’s pregnant, the discussions with managers and parents become pure soap opera, except, of course, that you assume she’ll have the abortion her boss so casually suggests.
The only theme that recurs is the demand for more pay and the lack of any real collective power on the part of labor, and in that regard the movie loses some of its own power by not tying the various tales of workers attempting to hold management to account into something cohesive. It’s more of a broken record, albeit one that gets louder with each revolution. There’s no resolution to the lives we see, and some of the more compelling individuals vanish from the movie without any explanation. What you end up with is a film that reveals with striking assurance how the men and women who know they are the future of China live their lives right now.
In Mandarin. Now playing in Tokyo at Theater Image Forum Aoyama (03-5766-0114).
I’ve only seen two of Andrew Haigh’s previous movies, but Lean on Pete and, especially, 45 Years gave me the impression he is a director who has little use for conventional sentimentality, no matter how much the material warrants it. His new one, however, exudes an emotional earnestness that relies on the viewer’s faith in its sticky fantasy premise, and by the end, though I found the love story affecting, it also struck me as corny. Perhaps the stickiness was already there in the source material, a 1987 novel I haven’t read by Taichi Yamada, but since Yamada’s tale took place in Japan and centered on a heterosexual affair, I would assume Haigh made significant changes when he moved it to London and adapted the love story for two men. I’m not the kind of person who thinks that queer love is substantially different from the straight kind once you remove the social elements (and I know many people will disagree), but I can’t help thinking that Haigh lightened the mood artificially. One of the main characters, after all, is presented as being depressed, maybe suicidal.
What All of Us Strangers shares with the above-mentioned two films is a spare cast. Adam (Andrew Scott) is a writer living in a modern apartment tower that appears to be almost deserted. The only other person in the block is someone he spies one evening while looking out his window. This man, Harry (Paul Mescal), notices the attention and, drunk, shows up at Adam’s door suggesting they spend some time together. Adam politely refuses the entreaty but it’s obvious he’s both intrigued and perplexed by the attention. Though he has made peace with his homosexuality, it’s still something he dwells on obsessively, conditioned by a closeted adolescence. Before we know it, Adam is back in his suburban home town, lingering outside the house where he grew up. His parents (Jamie Bell, Claire Foy) see him out on the sidewalk and invite him in, happy for the unannounced visit, and as Adam passes a mirror in the living room we catch a glimpse of him as a pre-teen. His parents, we learn, died in a car crash when he was about that age, and he was never able to talk to them about his sexuality. Here is the chance, and while these imaginary conversations are clearly ripe with longing and self-actualization, their implied value as therapy for a soul that’s never had the chance to hash out its confusions and paradoxes feels forced.
When Adam applies the insights he gains from these fantasies to his new relationship with Harry—a relationship that Adam, like a good patient, pursues with a positive attitude—the results are also positive: the sex is honest and satisfying, the emotional payback enlightening and empowering. Eventually, the relationship itself goes dark and enters the realm of fantasy, though to what end is never really clear. As heartbreaking as All of Us Strangers is, the use of these diversions to make sense of unpleasant truths has the effect of sentimentalizing the story.
Now playing in Tokyo at Toho Cinemas Nihonbashi (050-6868-5060), Toho Cinemas Chanter Hibiya (050-6868-5001), Toho Cinemas Shinjuku (050-6868-5063), Shibuya Cine Quinto (03-3477-5905), Toho Cinemas Roppongi Hills (050-6868-5024).
At its most sensitive, Spanish director Carlos Vermut’s fourth film is about a burgeoning love affair between two lonely but very different people. Julian (Nacho Sanchez) is a modeler for a video game company who specializes in weird, terrible creatures. He is the most engaged when working alone in his Madrid apartment on his creations, using a VR headset to filter his vivid imagination into visual monstrosities. Otherwise, he keeps himself aloof from others. Diana (Zoe Stein), the friend of a work colleague he meets at a party, is more vibrant—talkative, intellectually stimulating, and outgoing—but hemmed in socially by her obligations to an invalid father, whom she cares for religiously. Their mutual attraction is casual at first, since whereas his nature is uptight, hers is carefree, and it takes a while for them to connect on an emotional level. We’ve already seen how Julian’s anxieties get the best of his impulses. He picks up a woman in a bar and can’t get it up in bed, so the gradual approach with Diana is obviously more his speed; but as the source of Julian’s anxieties becomes clearer, the sensitive aspect of Vermut’s approach turns sinister.
Because at its base, Manticore, a word that describes a creature which is half man, half beast, isn’t a love story at all. It’s a horror story, but one whose power to frighten comes from its ability to evince disgust rather than any intent to evoke terror. Early on in the film, Julian saves a neighbor, a young boy named Christian, from a house fire, and while the purport of this valiant act isn’t telegraphed as anything more than a character-establishing incident, it continues to reverberate in ever increasing waves throughout the film, first making itself felt in Julian’s digital creations, and then in his physical state, wherein certain thoughts make him actually ill. Though the viewer starts to understand what’s going on, the love story washes over the real meaning of Julian’s troubled mind, keeping it submerged beneath his desire to form a relationship with Diana; that is, until circumstances converge to make him realize what it is that he really desires, and then he can’t face the truth.
Vermut’s true talent as a filmmaker is the way he renders these various indicators organically. The repulsion he manifests in the end isn’t triggered. It’s brought about through an accumulation of subtle hints that, in hindsight, seem way too clever—everything from Julian’s seemingly innocent confession that as a child he wanted to be a tiger when he grew up, to Diana’s pixie hairstyle—but they have been so carefully curated that you don’t notice as they pop up just how penetrating they are. They linger in the imagination, because just like Julian’s creatures, they are visceral and unique. It’s only Julian himself, a sullen introvert with a secret he can’t acknowledge to himself, who is terrifying.
In Spanish. Opens April 19 in Tokyo at Cinemart Shinjuku (03-5369-2831), Cine Quinto Shibuya (0303477-5905).
Back in 2020, shortly before Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike ran for a second term, a journalist named Taeko Ishii came out with a book about Koike called Jotei (Empress) that became an instant best-seller. Ishii included an interview with a woman who said she was Koike’s roommate when she was attending Cairo University in the 1970s and claimed that Koike never graduated from the university, which was significant since much of Koike’s brand as a public figure has been tied to not only graduating from Cairo University, but graduating at the top of her department, as she said. This achievement led to her reputation as being an expert on the Middle East and a fluent speaker of Arabic, which in turn helped get her a job as a TV news announcer and then boosted her prospects in politics. For a short time after Ishii’s book came out, Koike’s c.v. came under suspicion, since lying about one’s educational history violates election laws (and, in fact, seems to be a common practice), but eventually a statement appeared on the Facebook page of the Egyptian Embassy in Japan stating that Koike had indeed graduated from Cairo University and the matter was forgotten; or, at least, it was forgotten by the mainstream media.
Earlier this month the matter came up again when an article appeared in the May issue of the monthly magazine Bungeishunju by Toshiro Kojima, a former Koike aide who wrote that he inadvertently assisted in the coverup of Koike’s allegedly fraudulent c.v. in 2020. There was also an essay by the former roommate, Momoyo Kitahara, who had been referred to pseudonymously in the initial editions of Jotei, but who allowed Ishii to use her real name in the subsequent paperback editions. Kojima says in his piece that Koike summoned him to her office in the Tokyo Metropolitan Government building in June of 2020 after the book came out and asked him to help her get on top of the bad publicity it had stirred up. Kojima, who believed that she had graduated from Cairo University, said it was simple: Just call the university and get them to issue an official statement confirming that she had graduated. He assumed they would have to go through the Egyptian Embassy, which meant it might take time, so he was surprised when the desired statement appeared on the embassy’s FB page only three days later.
Kojima went into more detail in a video interview with Bungeishunju that was posted on the magazine’s website. He begins by explaining that he became acquainted with Koike when he was working for the Environment Ministry as the chief of the Global Environment Bureau. At the time, Koike was a Diet member in the ruling Liberal Democratic Party and had been appointed environment minister. They worked together on several ideas and came up with the Cool Biz policy wherein men were encouraged to eschew jackets and neckties in the summer to reduce energy consumption in offices. Later, she decided to run for governor of Tokyo in order to “destroy” the LDP’s dominance of the prefectural assembly, and she asked Kojima to join her team. His main task was moving the wholesale fish market from Tsukiji to Toyosu. When Koike left the LDP to form the Tomin First party, she selected Kojima to head it.
After Jotei was published and Koike summoned Kojima to talk about the c.v. problem, she showed him an invitation to a “Science Day” event being held by Cairo University. The invitation was for alumni, and Koike seemed to be showing it to him as proof she had graduated, which he didn’t need because he believed her. However, he thought it strange that the invitation included “unnecessary” information about the date she entered the university and the date she graduated. First, he told her just to get out her diploma and send copies to the media, but she seemed to think it wouldn’t be enough to convince people, and that’s when he suggested she contact the university to get proof from the source. The next day she called Kojima and asked what kind of information the statement from the university should include.
Kojima recalls that time was of the essence, since the LDP was planning to use the c.v. controversy against Koike in the assembly as a means of getting back at her. Also, she was planning to announce that she would run for a second term as governor of Tokyo and wanted to get the matter out of the way before the press conference. So while Kojima was surprised at the speed with which Koike was able to produce the statement, it was just as well she did.
In the posted statement, Cairo University affirms that Koike graduated from the Sociology Department in October 1976 and was issued a diploma. The statement also criticized the Japanese media for doubting Koike on the matter, since such doubt tacitly defamed the university and its alumni. The university said it would take legal action if it deemed such action was appropriate. Kojima told the Bungeishunju interviewer that the LDP immediately put a halt to their investigation of Koike and the media dropped the subject. Koike went on to win reelection easily.
However, after the election was over, Kojima was visited by another Koike advisor, a journalist he refers to as “A.” The journalist told him that it was he who wrote the Japanese language version of the Cairo University statement that appeared on FB, and he showed Kojima the email correspondence between him and Koike related to the matter. He added that Koike herself wrote the English language version of the statement, which also appeared on the FB page.
When the interviewer asks Kojima why he wrote the article for Bungeishunju, Kojima replied that he felt responsible for the coverup, especially after Kitahara had the courage to allow her real name to be used in subsequent editions of Jotei. He mentions that when he was in the Environment Ministry he was involved in the Minamata pollution matter, and was dismayed that those responsible for the widespread poisoning tried so hard to cover it up. It was one man, a doctor for Chisso, the company that caused the pollution, who made a difference by coming forward, just as Kitahara did. “So I felt that I had to come forward too,” says Kojima. Moreover, he had admired Koike because of her stated determination to break up the hidebound nature of Tokyo government, where all decisions were made by a handful of leaders in the LDP and some top bureaucrats. But during her second term she seemed to abandon this stance, since the same group of men are still running the show without any regard for the needs and desires of Tokyo residents. He now sees Koike as being the kind of politician who seeks office only for their own personal gain.
The title of Alex van Warmerdam’s latest feature is meaningless in terms of describing the film. It is called No. 10 because it is van Warmerdam’s tenth film, nothing more and nothing less; and, in fact, given the slippery nature of the plot, it sort of makes sense to give it a numeric marker rather than a title. Because van Warmerdam knows how to make quality films on a technical level, the pacing and atmosphere are assured, and the first half exudes a potent sense of intrigue with its story about a minor theater actor, Günter (Tom Dewispelaere), having an affair with his leading lady, Isabel (Anniek Pheifer), who is also the wife of Karl (Hans Kesting), the writer/director of the play he is presently rehearsing. The pair’s clandestine assignations are eventually noticed by Günter’s rival, Marius (Pierre Bokma), a sullen, incompetent amateur with an ailing wife. Moreover, Günter’s grown daughter, Lizzy (Frieda Barnhard), is also suspicious, and once Karl is hipped to the affair he starts tormenting Günter within the framework of the play they’re putting on.
Van Warmerdam uses the vacant, industrial-tinged setting of the Dutch city where this story is set to great advantage, and the grayish cast of the various interiors makes the movie feel cold and claustrophobic. Above it all hovers Günter’s provenance, which is mentioned in passing in the beginning, suggesting that he was raised by foster parents after being found wandering in a forest when he was five years old. Eventually, this part of the story takes over, with a whole additional group of characters, including two Catholic priests and a bunch of men who skulk around like secret agents. By the time Günter’s story is revealed, the entire love affair/stage play plot line has been abandoned.
It’s difficult to know what to make of No. 10, which feels experimental in that it doesn’t really have much reason to exist as a narrative work of art, because the two storylines are so alien to each other that the film could have been divided at the midpoint without any attendant loss of meaning. Joined together, however, they’re just baffling, especially since neither reaches any sort of conclusion. This is the first film I’ve seen by van Warmerdam, though I’ve heard of him—he seems like a major figure in Dutch cinema—and most of what I’ve heard is that he’s an acquired taste. I can now see why. I really don’t know what kind of viewer this would appeal to.
In Dutch, English and German. Now playing in Tokyo at Shinjuku Cinema Qualite (03-3352-5645).
In terms of verisimilitude, Sophia Coppola’s dramatization of the relationship between Elvis Presley and Priscilla Presley (nee Beaulieu) is much more convincing than Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis biopic, which was an obvious fantasia. Based on Priscilla’s own 1985 memoir, the new film necessarily centers on her experience, so what we get of Elvis is limited in scope: very little recreation of his music or performances, absolutely no Colonel Parker, and no inkling of what his life was like before he met Priscilla. Coppola is thus free to fix her attention on the kinds of things she’s famous for, like American kitsch (acres of shag carpet), the foibles of youthful desire, and a rather dreamy take on sexual attraction. At first, I thought the total absence of Presley’s own music in the film was a function of rights acquistion—though Priscilla is one of the film’s producers, she hasn’t controlled the estate for decades—but Coppola isn’t interested in Elvis as an icon or an artist, so she fills the soundtrack with anachronistic but familiar pop songs that have scant connection to the action they accompany. In the context of the movie, Elvis is simply a privileged male who lacks the maturity to understand his appetites, and thus is doomed to failure as a husband and, in the long run, a functioning organism.
For all that, the movie lacks any real drama. The opening sequence, which takes place in Germany during Elvis’s army stint, is the most effective. Fourteen-year-old Priscilla (Cailee Spaeny) is wasting away on the base where her officer step-father has been assigned. She hates being out of the U.S., and, as it happens, so does Elvis (Jacob Elordi), who makes up for it on the weekends by throwing elaborate parties for fellow G.I.s and other American expats. A soldier spies Priscilla sitting at a base soda fountain and invites her to one of these get-togethers. Of course, her parents object and a great deal of diplomatic discourse is expended to gain their permission, but once Elvis locks eyes on her he’s hooked, and for the rest of his stint won’t take no for an answer, despite the Beaulieus’ understandable reservations. When his obligation to the army is up and he returns to Memphis and his show biz career, Priscilla is heartbroken, and both Spaeny and Coppola elegantly capture the sense of utter despair that accompanies a foreshortened adolescent love affair. Eventually, Elvis moves Priscilla, still a minor, to Graceland, with her parents’ permission, where she finishes school (just barely) under the gaze of his stern father and big-hearted grandmother, and while during this time it’s clear that there’s no sex (much to Priscilla’s frustration—though Elvis obviously has other women for “that kind of thing”), Elvis’s gallant but domineering behavior toward his teenage bride-to-be is undeniably creepy. Even the storied Memphis Mafia, those good ol’ boys who were constantly at Elvis’s beck-and-call, realize this relationship is kind of sick, but no one has the courage or wherewithal to call it as they see it.
After Priscilla and Elvis marry in 1967, all bets are off, and once she’s given birth to Lisa Marie, she realizes she must resolutely contend with Elvis’s weaknesses, especially when it comes to pills and cheap, quick thrills that he believes have no consequences. Coppola’s characteristic directorial m.o. of mostly standing back from the interpersonal dynamic in her films and concentrating on the atmosphere and trimmings works while the dynamic is in development, but after Priscilla finally gains a measure of adult self-awareness, the movie sprints to its tragic finish with little regard for the emotional stakes. When Priscilla files for divorce, the feeling I got was: What took you so long?, even though they’d been married less than six years. Verisimilitude has its limits, too.
Opens April 12 in Tokyo at Toho Cinemas Chanter Hibiya (050-6868-5001), Kino Cinema Shinjuku (03-5315-0978), 109 Cinemas Premium Shinjuku (0570-060-109), White Cine Quinto Shibuya (03-6712-7225), Toho Cinemas Nihonbashi (050-6868-5060), Toho Cinemas Roppongi Hills (050-6868-5024), Yebisu Garden Cinema (0570-783-715).
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