Himizu

In Ozu, the problem is whether the modernising younger generation will care for their elders. That a few short decades later that generation would grow up and allow that kinship universe to be destroyed for the next generation would have been totally inconceivable to Ozu, but here, in this literally apocalyptic presentation of that fact, we see portrayed the consequences of this titanic shock, which leaves behind it only the shattered remnants of a civilisation. Relentless and devastating.

This is not a pleasant film. People call the Nolan Batman films dark, but this is a dark film. All of the characters are broken by society, ignored by a generation that has either used and discarded them or simply neglects them altogether. And yet for a dark film populated by such wounded individuals, the unifying message is strongly positive and humanistic. This is a film that loves its characters, flaws and all, and espouses that love to the viewer. I am glad I watched it.

This is the Anti-Ozu. This is a movie about an older generation callously abandoning a younger generation, burdening them with financial, environmental, and psychological ruin, leaving them in a state of being where love is met with indifference and dreams of a better tomorrow are just dreams. Sumida wants the valuable life of modest ambitions, yet even that is asking too much, because any day now his father could crash through his door and beat him into a pulp. Really dark and very good.

In a word, cathartic. To heal from tragedy, both personal and societal, we have to confront its causes.

A teenager with abusive parents and a rigid behavioral code struggles to survive in a small Japanese town that has been partially destroyed by the tsunami of 2011. It's actually a pretty typical coming of age story, the kid (a fairly obvious representative of Japan as a nation) trying to make sense of the world and define his place within it. Sion Sono's direction is unobtrusive and assured, but it ends on a weirdly hopeful beat after two hours of relentless misery, which feels a little cheap.

Sion is a difficult nut to crack. His style often seems chaotic and crude, but there is nonetheless an assured hand guiding his films through their unpredictable beats. He deals with serious social issues in a daring and totally unflinching way, but there is a cockeyed tone that borders on farce. Himizu is quite accessible by his standards, but it is still a grim and eccentric vision of alienated youth and social decay anchored by strong performances from Sometani and Nikaidou.

Maybe a little too obvious in its analogies and dream-before-dying logic, and way too much yelling, but that seems to come with the Sono territory. The dude has a tone, and he hits it relentlessly, and it just works for me, and holy shit Fumi Nakaidou.

Saw this at TIFF. Way too over-the-top in terms of the violence and unlikable characters, to the point where it becomes laughable. It has its good points though and almost redeems itself in the end, but it's too little too late.

Haunting, disturbing, sometimes messily over-the-top, this is my first time watching one of Sono's works and it’s not one that I shall shake easily. The first half has a fair share of black humour, but the laughs drain away as the brutality ramps up. Not entirely successful, and it's a little overlong, with an awful lot of shouting, but the two central portrayals of abused and unwanted children are exceptional.

I love Sono's use of Mozart's Requiem. I was surprised by its ultimate message, a positive one. Good and dark.

> Released in Sept. 2011, months before the infamous Beta Uprising meme gained traction (http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/beta-uprising). > Beta Uprising: the original story, confirmed. That said, the pain of the girl, Chazawa, not ever being recognized, given her facade, at times truly adds dimension to an already dysmal situation, even if such moments, as is the case for most of the film, rely for their impact on groundwork built by only a couple lines of dialogue.

Himizu estreava há 10 anos no Festival de Pusan. Gosto de Sion Sono, mas nunca até agora tive uma profunda admiração como muita gente tem a respeito dele, talvez porque além da sua usual estranheza ele tenha feito um dos mais hardcore coming-of-age do cinema e por isso mesmo tão palpável à vida real. DVDRip no MakingOff.