At the time, this wasn't the case, with the film losing money, which would in turn bankrupted Tati.

It is however, a new experience in the world of films, and fiction in general. Tati had intended the film to be something new, to be something he called a “spectacle cinématographique”, something similar to live theatre. However, what most people do not know is that PlayTime (1967) is more than a film —— it's a theme park.

Welcome to TatiVille. Enjoy your disorientation and reality!

There's a certain theme park I keep thinking of throughout my experience of seeing PlayTime (1967) for the first time.

When I was a kid, specifically ten years old, I had a memorable field trip with my school to this strange edutainment-focused indoor theme park. It is a 'city of children' called KidZania, where kids could play pretend to 'work' in various professions from firefighter, lawyer, journalist, pilot, forensics...everything except executives. Work (or rather, the simulation of it) becomes playtime.

The 'city' itself, while obviously a miniature of a city with child-sized work facilities, looked realistic. Yes, this is an actual theme park. And yes, they are at an extent, aware of the implications of the nature of the attractions (there's a good reason why the park and their cast members call it 'professions' instead of 'jobs').

Chances that you've seen the Defunctland video about the 'genre' of theme parks that KidZania belongs to, that are 'kid cities', with the video pointing out how these 'kid cities' reflects our consumerist society with all the corporate sponsorships baked into the attractions, with the excuse of “it's life as adults know it”. Meaning that children needed to be confronted by the reality of consumerism in the real world, somehow. The 'city' is consumerist because that's how it is in the real world, it seeps into the miniature as a result. (Whether or not the sponsorships 'pills' children into full acceptance of consumerism remains as debatable as the long-term effects are mixed to say the least, but that's another story, or rather, 'an other ztory')

But the miniature city has a surreal, liminal quality to it with the ceilings painted with blue sky and white clouds. Coupled with the dim lighting meant to simulate nighttime and buildings made in the style of the past and present, it looks like a city built inside of a René Magritte painting, which avoids the park from looking sterile and too much like reality. KidZania is the regime of light, in a sense. It keeps the nature of simulacra intact, and the uncanny valley qualities dominating the park, further hardening the wall of separation between it and the real adult world. Therefore, KidZania as the miniature of consumerist society becomes a spectacle, a playtime for kids and spectators to get lost in the zany land of 'kool' kids.

Is KidZania a real city? Ceci n'est pas un metropolitan. Because it's a theme park that immerses you in an imagination of metropolitan life. It's a city imagined through the eyes of a child, witnessing the hectic life of real world. If 'Fantasy' is the main keyword for Disneyland, then 'Reality' is the main keyword for KidZania. The park prides itself as being a 'Better World', a simulation of the real world that is obsessed with details, and yet fully committed in making its 'reality' look too palatable to children that it turns children into adults disillusioned with the actual reality that isn't as 'kool' and zany as the land of 'kool' kids that they stepped into years ago. These adults wish that real working life of adult world is playtime, just as how the park did it. How did this happen? The park's obsession in portraying reality instead turns the miniature city into simulacrum as defined by Gilles Deleuze in his work The Logic of Sense, where the simulacrum becomes an image without resemblance —– in that KidZania bears no resemblance to any existing city in the real world, even with all the corporate brands in the park's attractions. And so, the kids learn that reality isn't playtime, not like what the park had 'promised' them, wallowing and wishing for a better world. The Treachery of Reality.

Once upon a time, I walked inside of a fantasical recreation of our consumerist society that disillusioned my views of the real world. 15 years later, I became an adult and witnessed TatiVille, another city built from imaginations of the real world. I walked inTatiVille, doing the same thing as my trips to KidZania, without the play pretend part that is.

I'm not the first person to talk about KidZania in relation to PlayTime (1967), and not without reason —– PlayTime (1967) reminded me of it a lot. It even starts with a scene set in an airport terminal, just like how you enter KidZania, that is through an airport terminal facade!

TatiVille brought back my memories of KidZania. Hard to not do that with the film's vignette structure of focusing on one thing in TatiVille for a short time before moving on, which for me, felt very reminiscent to the 'gameplay' and overall structure of KidZania where every profession (attraction) takes 15-45 minutes to do, so kids can experience/roleplay as many professions as they want to. In TatiVille, you don't 'stay' in one cubicle —– you see the entire TatiVille, and the unique people inside of it.

Before KidZania, there was TatiVille, that opened to the public thirty-two years earlier....

And now onto the film itself:

TatiVille is a satiric, in-your-face microcosm of our hyperconsumerist, 'bland' society ruled by corporations and the lack of novelty. It looks 'unpalatable' to anyone. It looks 'unpalatable' by default. However, the genius of PlayTime (1967) is that it offers a playtime for the audiences instead of letting them see the dreariness of life and completely wallow in the ridiculousness of it in sadness. In TatiVille, people will find the makings of perfect days, either through the funny shenanigans that life brings them to, or the presence of people like Monsieur Hulot that gives novelty to their days. Even if they're stuck in the 'boring' world, the colors inside their souls will brighten their lives and make it fun. They are changing the world they live in —— into a world they long to live in.

However, nothing in this movie is bland, it's always full of new and novel things. Even with the 'gray' set design, everything is designed to be catchy with clever composition, to be looked at several times with the symmetry and details. Like theme park attractions that you can always go back to. There's always things in TatiVille that will catch your eyes. Each frame is brimmed with details, gags, and zany shenanigans. It's like a theme park. It's playtime!

While TatiVille looks sterile and 'bland' with the corporate-looking buildings, liminal insides, boring cubicles, advertisements and washed-out colours, you can actually feel so much life breathed on it through what's in TatiVille. Never before a boring corporate world look this appealing. And it all owes to the details the background where visual gags, funny background events, and overall hecticness of people in it becomes the grasps of life, resisting the takeover of 'corporate' and keeping the world to look like your imaginations of adulthood and Paris — rejecting the dull reality and wanting to live in a better world. This mixture of hyperreality and whimsy makes the city brimming with uncanny valley that avoids the film from looking like reality. It looks so real, and yet unreal, just like a theme park.

With the curious Monsieur Hulot not wanting to 'conform' to the dullness of corporate life by wandering around, the 'corporate' TatiVille becomes a spectacle of your imaginations of Parisian adult life, straying away from the reality of Paris that the film wants to show you. It makes the film feel like a simulation of Jacques Tati's imaginations of real life. The real life as Tati knew was heading into a consumerist, corporate direction, and it seeps into TatiVille as a result. It's up to the inhabitants to react and live as themselves to fight against it.

Is TatiVille a real city? Ceci n'est pas un metropolitan. Because it's not Paris. It is TatiVille, an immersive, miniaturised depiction of one's imagination of De Gaulle's France. Even when he ruins France, that doesn't mean that he can ruin the people inside it. The people in TatiVille embraces zaniness slowly, as a way to express their growing feelings of disagreement to the 'bland' reality they live in. The closer TatiVille tries to become the real world of De Gaulle's France, the more fantasical it becomes that the city no longer resembles De Gaulle's France, as the people in TatiVille begins to form a new reality, deviating from De Gaulle's France. The film is satirical, and yet it produces an idealised image of reality that people would like to live in. TatiVille instead promises the audience that there is a better world, it's still possible to build one in the middle of corporate takeovers, which is hammered even more in the film's ending. The Treachery of Reality.......that might form a new reality. TatiVille is preparing you for a world you'll want to create.

Get Ready For A Better World.

Every scene in this film felt like theme park attractions, with its own process, start/endpoints, durations, and unique interactions. This gives TatiVille a lot of personality, adding the feelings of whimsy and zaniness that gradually builds up before it fully explodes in the second part where the film fights back against the dreariness and becomes a full-on 'theme park' spectacle, really accentuating the film's very apt title.

The way the camera shows working life in TatiVille brings you in as a visitor to this unique, theme park-ish city. Never staying on the same situation, always showing new and different things, like a visitor engaging in attractions. There's busy airport workers, tourists and tour guides, a flower seller, office workers, salesmen, waiters, cooks, and a busy street. But we don't just merely see them. We also experience them through how the camera focuses on them for a long while before moving on. These are the theme park attractions that TatiVille offers you to experience.

Through the camera and Monsieur Hulot's reactions, the film lets you experience TatiVille as a visitor engaging in the world of the film, and by the time the film ends, you're begging for more. You want the playtime to last forever. You will want to visit TatiVille again and again, to experience all the attractions, especially the ones you haven't experienced. You want to pick up new details in these attractions, and the park's environment. And the lesson you will learn through TatiVille is the desire to fight corporate formality by being zany and whimsical.

Jacques Tati's direction is nothing short of a spectacle. It's less of 'film directing' and more of theme park managing, with the synergy of actors, sets, camerawork creating a whole new immersive world for the viewer to experience through the screen. He accomplishes the task of a Walt Disney with so much ease, you'd believe that Tati would run a successful theme park (Hulotland?), and you wouldn't believe that this film had difficulties in the making. Nearly every scene is a painting, and the staging is very complex, with a lot of actions and directions and events going on in the same frame, and yet never overwhelms the viewer, easily comparable to theme park engineering. The way everyone and everything intersects in TatiVille is the stuff that gets theme park engineers jealous. So much clever planning, patient organizing, and deceptively simple yet difficult choreography.

However, this film does take a LOT of patience to watch. You need to be in the mood for a fun time in a theme park to watch it. It demands you to look at the many details baked into the frames. It doesn't have a 'clear plot' and clearly wants you to be immersed in the atmosphere and the world of TatiVille instead of telling a clear story. The pacing also gets slow at times, but that's what waiting in lines in theme parks are.

In a sense, PlayTime (1967) is a theme park movie. In that the world of TatiVille is just that immersive, built by skilled Imagineers with true vision and story to tell, that you felt really teleported into this new world. Yes, it's a satire of the real world, but wrapped in a fun packaging that you just can't help but get amazed, shocked, and excited at.

So what are you waiting for? Put on your RFID bracelets, get your plane tickets to TatiVille now and experience a one-of-a-kind playtime!

#review #film #Letterboxd #JacquesTati #MonsieurHulot

I'm back at the cafe! Now onto the third entry of the コーヒーが冷めないうちに book series by Toshikazu Kawaguchi.

But wait....this looks different, yet familiar. I am now at Café Donna Donna for more coffee, views of the seas, comedy, and....death.

And I wonder to myself, am I truly living in the present?

You can read my thoughts here for the first book and the second book. The series do gradually get better and that's why I'm back for more by reading the third book of this series! Even though it's still the same thing as the previous two books, I can see why these sequels exist.

They're saying something different, but ultimately arriving at the same uplifting conclusion each time.

And that's too good to be ignored, even though let's be clear, this book series is nothing special. There's already tons of 'reflexive' Japanese media like this one, and this book series seems to only offer its sci-fi elements to bring something new in the table. I mean come on, waitresses being living TARDISes hasn't even been explored in Doctor Who.

But the thing is....the formula works. If it ain't broken, just keep doing it. And yet, I still have tears in my eyes.

And so, once again, with the album “Steve McQueen” by Prefab Sprout still playing in my ears, wistful evenings in my home, and coffee in my desk, I am back at the cafe to think, to feel, and to go back to the past before the coffee gets cold.

As I finish this book, the cup of coffee in my mouth tells me to live in the present. Full (LONG) thoughts under the cut, as usual.

The first thing you need to know about this book is that while it's set in Hakodate instead of Tokyo, you still need to read the previous two books to get the entire picture. For starters, Kazu and Nagare remains as the main forces of the cafe.

This book opens with a direct reference to the fourth story of the first book due to the timey-wimey things in that story. So you're going to be lost if you haven't read those.

And even though the story is taking the reader into the breezy and calmer region of Hakodate with a new set of patrons and a new staff, the backstory of Café Donna Donna ties heavily to things about Kazu and Nagare's backstory that gets told in Book 1 and 2.

The new cafe is the first thing you see in the book. It has a better description that the Tokyo one and it looks rather unique, it actually makes me want to visit this nonexistent cafe in real life. The story being set in Hakodate also gives it a different, calmer vibe. I can actually picture myself sipping coffee in the balcony, looking at the rivers of Hakodate. “Bonny” by Prefab Sprout vibes wonderfully well with the new setting, in fact.

Something that this book also has in that there's a clear device that woven the stories. Several parts of the story contains snippets of stuff from the in-universe 'self-help' book “What If the World Were Ending Tomorrow? One Hundred Questions.” that I find interesting and adds to the message.

In addition, Reiji (the new waiter) and the patrons have little to no connections to the patrons of Funiculi Funicula in Tokyo so these are completely new set of people.

With a new set of stories, grief, and.....thoughts of death.

My love and I, we work well together. But often we're apart....Absence makes the heart lose wager, 'Till love breaks down, love breaks down...

New setting does not mean that we're starting from zero. The first story actually tries to subvert the typical formula that readers are accustomed to. Now, what if someone wants to go back to the past to curse and spit on someone for giving them a screwed-up life?

(this means that “Desire As” as Prefab Sprout immediately plays in my ears)

Although the way the story begins is pretty jarring, given that after pages of a normal day at the cafe you're immediately thrown with so much anger. The suicidal main character has so much pain and anger that her very reactionary personality and actions contrast heavily with the 'calm' setting. This, however, makes way for the story to turn into a Christmas Carol-like story where the main character sees the past and experiences a change of heart.

I admit, this was pretty damn effective for me. I actually cried at the end. The bleak, pessimistic main character with so much baggage....i feel her pain. I feel her woes and seeing her get better makes me tear up. It's such an escapist story by the end of the day, to go look at the core of your problems and actually face it —– and have it resolved.

And yes, it is one of those stories where the message ultimately boils down to “things will get better if you just admit your pain”, but I feel so doomed and sick of everything right now and this story is a comfort and a reminder for me to keep going, and how things will get better.

If you thought that the first story is bleak enough, the second actually answers the burning question that every reader of Book 1 and 2 might have asked to themselves: “So, if you stay in the past and not go back to the present, you die and become the ghost in the seat? Wouldn't someone attempt to kill themself this way, then?”

And it answers the question with little drama. For starters, the main characters of this story are a duo of comedians. While the book don't get to actually show in detail on what kind of manzai act they are (probably because the author can't write manzai but what do I know about comedy anyway), this choice in writing highlights how even the funniest smilers could go down the drain when emptiness that the death of a loved one hits them. The suicide ideation is devastating to read. And it hits hard. With zero funny ha-has.

This is very much a story that we need today. Emptiness is devastating, and it can lead to terrifying thoughts and actions. Even the brightest and happiest people could fall victim to the void.

But this story tells you that no, the glass isn't half-empty. Moving on with the feeling that your passing loved ones are supporting you and helping you fills the glass. The glass is ultimately, half-full after all. And certainly people want to fill yours too.

Oh my, Oh my, have you seen the weather? The sweet September rain

Rain on me, like no other Until I drown, until I drown

If you thought that this book will stop there, you're wrong. Third book directly tackles the problem of denying the pain from losing a loved one. The 'denial' phase of five stages of grief. Denial so great, that reality actually crumbles down.

Grief and Denial sometimes blurs reality that you'll run the risk of living in an invalid reality, and this book tackles this topic pretty well and concise enough without being too over-the-top. And it doesn't even add more fantasy elements (the TARDIS coffee is enough). It comes off as All Of Us Strangers (2023) without the fantasy elements.

The main character's pain is very hard to read, it's too real. There's nothing more devastating than dreaming of a passing loved one, thinking they're alive, only to wake up and find that they're no longer here. It really screws up your brain and it's not talked enough, and I'm glad that the third story brings this up.

Yes, the denouement and message of the story is corny. It's so schmaltz! it's so cheap! and yet, somehow, i -HAVE- to hear the message being said to me, as someone who had experienced a similar thing. It feels hopeful and got me rethinking about how to honor a passing loved one.

The fourth story is where it all wraps up. It's relatively less dramatic than the previous three stories as it suddenly shifts into something that you'd see in the first book: the pain of not being able to tell your feelings before it's too late.

What makes it different is that one of the problems that the characters face here is the inability to communicate well. Throughout the book series, this has been a source of many conflicts but most of the time the characters resolve this as soon as they get to do the time traveling bit. Here, it's still a problem even after the time traveling bit, and this leads to the book series's biggest message of 'living in the present' being reminded to the audience.

When love breaks down, the things we do, to stop the truth from hurting you, When love breaks down, the lies we tell, they only serve to fool ourselves.

SPOILER and TMI section!

The third story hit me the hardest because I understand Reiko's pain. You may recall in my post about the 2nd book where I mentioned that one of my best friends passed away.

I still dream of her months after she passed away. Then I woke up only to find that she's gone. It was a miracle that i did not develop any hallucinations during the early pandemic. Looking back, that was very strong of me, to not let 'invalid reality' invade my brain and distance me from people who support me.

For days, i couldn't accept reality. I cried for hours and again. There was a risk that my reality will break down and get me detached. It's a miracle that it didn't happen to me. But the pain made me numb. I feel pain, but i don't know what to do. I became aimless, in which I am facing the consequences from it today.

All because i couldn't smile because of her passing. It's actually pretty sad that it took me more than a year to finally accept my reality and stop moping and frowning over her passing —– through a hyperfixation that she'd be happy to see me showing joy out of. I once thought that my accomplishments would mean nothing now that she's gone, but so.....why shouldn't I be happy and proud? Why should my grief stop me from feeling joy? She would've been happy too, after all.

She'd be joyful if I keep living after her passing, she'd be disappointed if I see her passing as the end of my everyday life, as something that stops me from living in the present.

Everything will be OK. Death is not the end. And she'll be happy to hear that.

When love breaks down, the things we do, to stop the truth from hurting you, When love breaks down, the lies we tell, they only serve to fool ourselves.

And this ties back into the books —— the stories are touching the subject of suicide that comes from grief. It really, really is a very harsh problem. I get why this book had to do that. grief just kneecaps your life and progress if you don't know how to process it and if you don't know that you can overcome it by making your life grow bigger than your grief (while NOT denying it) and accept it as a part of life and move on.

A reason why I like this book series is for not overly-dramatizing grief, with the dramatic reactions being just reactions to it. the portrayal of grief gets realistic at times. and I've been there before.

Ultimately, installment is about....death and loss. There's a lot more death and the dread and grief that comes from it. The previous books are more about regrets, guilts, and goodbyes and now this one dives head-on to the topic of death...suicide ideation...emptiness....denial...and how living in the moment is the way to overcome that because we don't know when will death comes for us all.

As repetitive as the books are, the different themes of each book keeps it 'fresh'. each book has something different to say, and this is not an exception.

While I highly enjoyed the book, it's not the first work to tackle the topic of death this way. Nawapol Thamrongrattanarit had done this before with his masterfully devastating work Die Tomorrow (2017), tackling the similar topic on how death shouldn't be the thing that stops us from living our lives fully in the present. Death in serenity, as a closure, as the end of a chapter, as a fuel to live in the present.

This book is more focused on the latter. on how death shouldn't be something that stops us from living and doing better things.

Death shouldn't be a reason why you shouldn't find happiness and comfort. everyone dies in the end, after all. and the death of a loved one does not mean the death of our hearts and soul. nor does it mean that our lives are stopped in a stasis.

And also, we should not let death break love down.

Understandably, death can get people bewildered. Death can get people do baffling reactionary things to eachother. Death can change people for the worse. Death can cause guilt and depression. but now that we're still in the present...live in it as if death comes for us all.

Live as if the world is ending tomorrow.

SPOILER and TMI section ends

When love breaks down, the things we do, to stop the truth from hurting you, When love breaks down, you join the rest, who leave their hearts for easy sex

There's actually a lot to love for this book, from snippets from the aforementioned “What If the World Were Ending Tomorrow? One Hundred Questions.” book that can be fun for readers to answer themselves, seeing a duo of comedians with the name “PORON DORON”, the sudden shift to 'dark mode' (black page + white text) in the printed edition to depict a blackout, to a random Connecticut mention halfway through. It's certainly an improvement from the second book.

However, if I have to mention weaknesses —– it's the new characters. The Tokyo patrons all have distinct personalities that are easy to tell. You can immediately spot what kind of people they're like, as much as I had a problem with how the first book was written. In this book, the new patrons don't really go beyond their occupations, though I feel that Kawaguchi wanted this book to be less stage-y and more realistic but certain characters feel undercooked.

And also, Sachi....Kazu's 7 year old daughter has a very...interesting (read: baffling) characterization. How is she 7 years old and reads philosophy, a book compiling academic discourses on Picasso, and quantum mechanics?? Couple this with Miki's lapses of keigo in the second book and it's clear that author Toshikazu Kawaguchi has....interesting ideas of what kids under 10 are like. He really, really think Shounibyou is the same as Chuunibyou. He really thinks that kids aged 7 are the same as 14-year-old pretentious teenagers.

I understood that it's a way for her to read the fictional book so that the book's message and stories can be brought together, but the fact that she's 7 years old makes it jarring.

(but like for real, he thinks that shounibyou is 'kids reading philosophy and difficult topics they deem cool' and not 'acting out their favourite cartoons'.....except that the former is chuunibyou which happens to teenagers because they are teens!)

Unfortunately, I have to address yet another weakness, because, again, we have yet another weird writing about 'giving birth is a wonderful thing'. Because I really do not think that the question of “if you're inside your mother's womb and the world ends tomorrow, would you kill yourself or stay born?” was necessary at all. This, however, is limited to two passages so it wasn't as egregiously weird as similar stuff in the previous two books. I do hope it's no longer a thing in the fourth and fifth book...

I do admire how the 4th story doesn't do the “and we're gonna have kids” thing. It ends with an immediate future promise and ends there. This feels like another attempt to address the criticisms of the 4th story in the 1st book, which is alright to me.

That aside, I had a great time reading this book. Yes, the book still felt like an 80s ballad in book form, as was the previous two books —– but darker, this time. And again, that's not a bad thing. It's definitely what the books was going for and I can feel it fully.

We have seen what people would do if given the chance to go back to the past. Now we see that people will try to break from the clutches of loss and pain of the past to be in the present.

And once again, that's arguably what we need today.

Take a sip, and go back to the past. Say goodbye to tragedy, and plant the seeds of the future in the present.....before the coffee gets cold.

When love breaks down, when love breaks down....

And that concludes the month of coffee for me. I will, of course, read the fourth and fifth book as soon as they get translated, so stay tuned for more...

Note (because I can't put this anywhere): If you notice something, I've been repeating “Appetite” by Prefab Sprout during my journey in reading these three books. Well, you can see that it's because that the song and album happens to have similar themes as this book series.

This is a good opportunity to tell the story of why am I even reading this book series. See, it all started a month ago, in a boring morning, with me doing 80s British music shopping. And then, I found this song. I thought it was beautiful, but then I listened to the album version....and it's one of the most beautiful songs I've ever heard. Before you know it, the song was on repeat in my ears. And then, I listened to “Appetite”, then the whole album (“When the Angels” is pretty good too!).

I thought that “Steve McQueen” is a beautiful, if not underrated album. I was imagining the perfect movie for this album, a slice-of-life movie about a shop that sells interesting items. Records, clothes from past eras, used music instruments, accessories, and such, with the stories focusing on the shopkeepers' sad stories and the patrons taking refuge from their pain through these items —– to represent the sophisti-pop sound of the album.

However, the album having a production work by Thomas Dolby means that the story needed a fantasy element. The fantasy element could represent his 'shiny/キラキラ' keyboard work and synths, along with the album's curious structure and wistful feeling that he brought into. And so I thought, what if these items can send its' buyers back in time to the past, to make them face their pain and resolve it, to ultimately live in the present?

The story sounded perfect in my head....and then I was informed that there's an actual book with the exact same premise (and was adapted into a movie as well, with a J-Drama adaptation coming soon). I just couldn't help myself and bought a copy of the first book immediately. And now here I am, finished with the third book, wistfully thinking about my own regrets, grief, and emptiness, and how to get myself back in my own two feet. And I will come back for the fourth and fifth book.

As for the forthcoming American movie adaptation...well....I don't know about that. All Of Us Strangers (2023) proves that you could make an English-language adaptation of Japanese books pretty well...and knowing that, I kind of hope that the American movie adaptation of Before the Coffee Gets Cold will be as good as the former.....though I wish it's being adapted as a British production and will feature two songs produced by Thomas Dolby, just like how All Of Us Strangers (2023) has two songs produced by fellow 80s mad scientist new waver Trevor Horn in the soundtrack.

[First posted on Tumblr in May 2, 2024]

#BookReview #BeforeTheCoffeeGetsCold #CafeFuniculiFunicula #ToshikazuKawaguchi #review #BeforeYourMemoryFades

And now I have thoughts and some words about myself....

I wrote my thoughts on the first book here, and as you can see, I liked the premise enough despite the MAJOR shortcomings, because I believe that when done well, the premise could be something profound and wonderful. Also I'm a sucker for both reflexive time travel plots and sad slice-of-life.

So, with the album “Steve McQueen” by Prefab Sprout playing in my ears, rainy days on my window, and lounging in my desk, I am back at to immerse in the wistful atmosphere of the story, ready to go back to the past before the coffee gets cold.

I am happy to report that the second book is better than the first! There are significant number of improvements here and there, and it seems that author Toshikazu Kawaguchi listened to some of the criticisms of the first one...

Upon finishing, it felt like a nice cup of coffee after a somber rainy day. Full thoughts and a little story about me under the cut.

Oh my, oh my. Have you seen the weather? The sweet September rain....

Upon finishing, it felt like a nice cup of coffee after a somber rainy day. Full thoughts and a little story about me under the cut.

First off, while the stories aren't that much different than the first book, there's a unifying theme that ties them all together that makes the book's message clearer. Now I know what this series is going for very well. I'll get to that later.

What about the characters that aren't Kazu and the patrons? Personally, it's great to see Nagare and Miki. Miki really is a good successor to Kei, but sometimes her childish antics feels a little forced. That's not to say she's not endearing. It's just that I wish she's better than being an exaggerated version of a 6-year-old.

The time travel element is also explored even more. The characters now make good use on what they can do with the power of temporary time travel and as a result, things gets pretty....creative, especially in the third story. And also, we finally get to know who the ghost in the cafe is....and it's real sad!

As for the stories itself, the book starts with a pretty solid one. Unlike the first book's first story that feels like nothing, this sequel starts with a strong tearjerker but with lines that'll make one smile. Yes, it's a standard “I want to meet you before you die for the happiness of my loved one” story, but the way this one is set up and done is just...wonderful. Definitely a strong opener that really showed what the book sells itself as. It promises me four sad stories, and I got a sad story RIGHT at the beginning. That's how you get me into a book.

And what's better than that? Guys being dudes!! The first story is just a wholesome 'guys being dudes' story, and quite escapist in some ways.

The “From now on....you have two fathers. It's me and your dad, who is my bestie” thing in the first story is just the best. I like how the characters didn't even question the implication behind one of them saying that his daughter has two dads now. In fairness, they're a lil bit too close to eachother....are they....yknow 👀👀

Second story felt like a retread of the first book's third story in that it is once again, about a dying relative, but there's something that made this second story great: the main character. He's 24, broke, has a degree in art, no prospects, and jobless. And he gets a nice ending. That alone made me like the story and honestly? I know that it's corny that his time travel fixes his life but it's a nice escapist story. I wish I can have his ending....

(seems that escapism is also a thing in this second book)

Now, the third story is unfortunately, where the book falters. I was having a good tearjerking time with the first two stories....until the third one. It actually starts off interestingly by starting with someone already doing the time travel thing instead of doing the 'cafe situation with Kazu/Nagare/patron –> introduction –> flashbacks –> time travel' structure that every other stories have. It breaks the repetition and this third story is commendable for that.

But....oh boy. Remember how the fourth story of the first book had weirdly-written stuff about pregnancy and how it idealises 'give birth even if it kills the mother'? Apparently there's a similar thing in this third story. I can't give the specifics but it's just. Jarring to see this author trying to write a character getting over a miscarriage by waxing poetic. Especially because the message is not that different from the other stories.

At the very least it's not a big plot point and the woman's reproductive issue isn't treated as the end of the world. Feels like this third story was the writer realizing that the fourth story of the first book did came out weird and rather unfortunate in its implications and attempted to give correction by reversing the genders of the characters? That's what I am getting.

While the third story managed to shake up the structure to not make the book repetitive, it is unfortunately, needlessly complicated. When a 'plan' sounds like technobabble when explained, that's when the plan might not be a good idea. It just makes the book look goofy and attempting to look 'quirky'.

However, credits where it's due: Fumiko, aka the main character of the first story of the first book is back and she's written better this time! No more 'moping for her boyfriend' kind of Fumiko! Finally, Fumiko gets to show her brain for once...even though it's kind of ruined by her boyfriend's weird technobabble comparing their situation to programming.

I do love the theme of the third story (sometimes we just lie to stop the truth from hurting others), it could've been done without the overly-convoluted setup.

Fourth story feels like a retread of a story from the previous book, and for some reason it needed to give readers a recap of the previous book. The main character is a detective here and I feel that Kawaguchi made him a detective as an excuse to do that. It doesn't make the reading experience 'less', mind you, but...was it really needed? These stories work well as stand-alones to begin with.

That being said, it's the story that ties the book's message together. Through this patron's time travel, we finally see what the author wanted to say, and ties it to everyone in the book. And one that ties back to the Cafe itself. See, in these stories, we mostly only know the patrons well. Their personalities, dreams, wishes, regrets, and grief....not a lot of room for us to get to know Kazu. We did get to know Nagare in the first book, but not much on Kazu and the cafe itself.

Like the third story, we get another shake-up in the formula. Now it's the rules of the time travel that gets shaken up. Now, something different happens. And this something ties back to Kazu.

When love breaks down, the things we do, To stop the truth from hurting you,

Yes, this book is about Kazu too. Crumbs of Kazu's backstory (related to the ghost in the cafe too) FINALLY gets revealed after nearly nothing from the first book and her near-passive role.

Though, a lot of Kazu's backstory gets crammed in the third story, with the first and second story only giving us small hints into Kazu's personality and life before the cafe, and why she's willing to send people back to the past. And when a lot of these travelers found happiness from the past —— what about Kazu? What does she get? Does she feel the same way?

This book delves into that, although mostly on the third and fourth story. I wish that it's not crammed in the two stories though. Would've tied the book better if all four stories have these moments with Kazu. It's a shame because the second story has a perfect opportunity to Kazu to question her agreement in sending people back to the past.

Like each story should've emphasized more on Kazu's shell breaking slowly. I would've loved to see Kazu's shell cracking in the fourth story. Not with dramatic whimpering, but with something that breaks Kazu's 'almost mechanical' actions. Like, make her more 'feeling'.

Personally, Kazu is my favourite character and she's why I'm still tuning in the book series. Helps that she's played by the wonderful Kasumi Arimura in the movie, and she's exactly how I pictured Kazu....it's easier to read the book while imagining Kasumi Arimura's Kazu.

The sudden focus on Kazu is a surprise, though it gives the book a new focus. While the first book completely focuses on the cafe sending people back in time and how it affects the patrons, the second book focuses on how it affects Kazu herself as the one who pours the “TARDIS coffee” on patrons.

The first book almost never questions Kazu's reactions, and the book makes her to be this precise, almost-mechanical person who just does what she's told to do. What we didn't know is that she hides a lot of pain and grief behind her sommelier smile. She looks like she could burst to tears anytime.

This book slowly shows the cracks in Kazu's precise, sharp personality. It makes her more human, because it's very hard to be a constant reminder of death, sadness, hurt, and pain, isn't it? At one point in the book, she even lies and forgets to do something important in the time travel ritual. Kazu is worried that she would cause love to break down.

There's a lot of words to describe Kazu, but I can't do that without spoiling a lot and getting off-track....let's just say “When Love Breaks Down”, the entire time, is about Kazu.

(You could make the case that this book should've been called “Before Love Breaks Down”, even)

And that brings me to what this book is saying, and what does it say about grief and survivor's guilt —– and happiness.

SPOILER and TMI section!

When love breaks down, the lies we tell, They only serve to fool ourselves.

This second book has heavy emphasis on survivor's guilt. Guilt from being the one who lives while your loved ones die, specifically. All the stories are about death and grief, which fits better with the premise.

“Are we allowed to feel happy with death and pain around us?”

That is the theme of the second book. It is a good theme, and I'm glad that this book is written with that as the main theme. It's corny (like a lot of 80s ballads are) but I do feel that. Sometimes, i feel that i do not deserve respite nor any smile after seeing and experiencing tragedies in life.

Four years ago, I lost one of my best friends. She passed away suddenly.

It's unfair that i get to live and have fun experiences with friends while she's six feet under. I thought that if I feel happiness, it's unfair because she couldn't, and my survival and long age is a curse I have to bear for her passing. But if there's anything I learned from that time two years ago when I had one of the happiest moments in my life, my happiness is what my she had wanted wanted. And my life isn't a curse.

I was so happy. I did feel guilty that she's not here to see it. But i went to the other direction: would she be happy that you get to have this moment? Would she be happy that your art skills got into this level? Would she be happy that you get to have something that is uniquely yours?

By feeling happiness, it's not just mine. It's hers.

And this book is saying that. Happiness is not something only you can have, or you cannot have. One's happiness is the happiness of others. And so is pain and sadness.

And this book is saying that. Happiness is not something only you can have, or you cannot have. One's happiness is the happiness of others. And so is pain and sadness.

Over the years, I've tried to live and move on. It is difficult to be a reminder that my survival is at the expense of hers. It is difficult to be a reminder that the world is not fair, and it is difficult to be happy knowing that she couldn't have it.

But, if I can share my happiness with people who are here with me, I could share it with those who are gone too.

My happiness is her happiness. And it will not break down.

The stories in this book really made me think that. It feels good to know that I wasn't alone in feeling cursed with age and happiness, but you can break it without having to completely surrender yourself to grief. Because grief is not forever. Sure, our lives mold around it instead of growing out of it, but making peace with it is the key to moving on.

And an important part of it is to accept that your happiness is their happiness too. If your life stops because of grief, wouldn't that made them sad also?

I'm glad that the book ends with Kazu realizing that she IS allowed to live in happiness and move on from her mother's death, and I'm glad that her seeing other people being able to be happy made her realize that she too, could have it.

This made the book better than the first.

SPOILER and TMI section ends

When love breaks down, you join the rest, Who leave their hearts for easy sex,

I got too emotional that I nearly forgot to actually give a verdict to the book. Sorry about that, this book made me more emotional than the first.

As for the writing itself, this sequel is markedly less stage-y. The writer is definitely getting more and more fluent in writing actual books.

Is it still corny? Yes. Like I've said before, the first book felt like an 80s ballad in book form, and so is this sequel. This sequel being more literary makes the '80s ballad' vibes and energy of the book even more apparent. To me, this whole entire book series is now compilations of 80s ballads. And that's not a bad thing! It feels like that's exactly what these books are going for, and it truly delivers.

(Even the fourth story has a brief flashback set in the 80s)

The first book asks us what we'll do if we get back to the past. The second book asks us how can we live in the present without having to let the past trap us.

And that's arguably what we need today.

Take a sip, and go back to the past. Face the past, walk to the present.....before the coffee gets cold.

....Once again, I had a good time in the unique coffeehouse that is Cafe Funiculi Funicula. Now I'm off to Hakodate to Cafe Donna Donna next, to take a sip of their coffee to reflect and live....

[First posted on Tumblr in April 20, 2024]

#BookReview #BeforeTheCoffeeGetsCold #CafeFuniculiFunicula #ToshikazuKawaguchi #review

So, I've been spending my week reading Before the Coffee Gets Cold (2015) solely for the premise. It's not quite sci-fi, but grounded enough to put me in a breeze.

At a glance, the premise of “a cafe that can get their patrons back in time but it can't change the present” intrigued me. Not to mention that I have the perfect album to listen to while reading, to immerse myself in the wistful, warm feeling of the premise.

The fact that the cafe cannot change the present gives the premise an opportunity to provide meaningful insights on how the looking into the past might not change the present, but it will give us will to live in the present and build our futures. Previously, I really loved Petite Maman (2021) for exploring a similar premise with similar insights and I was so stoked to hear that there are more stuff like this. Also, stories like this IS my bread and butter after all.

Now that I finished it.....it was a mixed experience. Full thoughts under the cut.

Absence makes the heart lose wager. 'Till love breaks down, love breaks down...

I grabbed the first book a few days ago and finished it. To tell the truth, I liked it, but the first and fourth story left a bitter aftertaste in my mouth. I hated how Fumiko was written and described in the first story.

It's just that....this doesn't feel right. I don't like how Fumiko is written as this smart genius omniglot woman who flails herself completely for a guy who isn't worth much? And making her entire angst revolving around wanting to marry someone because her siblings had gotten married? That's a rather weird way to write a female character in my personal opinion. And I have to admit that her physical description gets....weird. This I feel, is an artifact left from the book's original form as a stage play.

For a book that sells itself as full of heartwarming sad tales, the first story didn't do a lot for me. Maybe it's that the character's problems are quite trivial compared to the other three stories....kind of fitting as an introduction to the book's small world of Cafe Funiculi Funicula, I guess?

While I teared up at the end of the fourth story, I am admittedly growing tired of the glorification of “give birth anyway even if it kills the mother!” stories, especially those that are written by men. Which is a shame considering that I liked the focus character even though her characterization slides close to a manic pixie dream girl a few times. I do admire how the fourth story did explore the time travel concept further...I just wish that it was used in a better story.

While I loved the second and third story, the way the main character is written in the end where she basically gets a complete 180 to her parents felt way too unrealistic and a little insulting. I just...don't feel great seeing the main character just leaves her independent life to serve her parents even if it's her shared dream with her sister and she's doing it to honor her. It CAN be done...but not this sudden. It should've had more time rebuilding her relationships with her parents.

I didn't find anything objectionable with second story besides the maiden name thing (i find it rather off) —– and I did cry at the end of the story. It's the best part of the first book for me, and it's why I decided to continue on with the book series, since the book series reportedly gets better and better by each sequel.

Another thing that held back the first book's potentials besides the writing of the first and the fourth story is the writing style. This book was adapted from a stage play, and you can tell that writer Toshikazu Kawaguchi struggled with translating the story from stage form to literary form. The writing felt like someone who is writing a book in a language they're not fluent at (in this case, a playwright writing literature), and as a result, some parts can feel too 'stage-y' instead of occurring naturally.

Rain on me, like no other. Until I drown, until I drown...

The book's tone is....stage-y. And sometimes feel corny in a similar way that The Fault in Our Stars is. However, this book manages to cultivate an atmosphere that feels like being in a cafe, so it's not that corny after all....actually, I have a better description.

If i can describe this book's tone as music, I would describe it as an emotional, easy-listening 80s ballad with a melancholic tone, complete with synthesizers (by someone like Thomas Dolby.....like in the song I linked above). The kind of 80s ballad you'd hear in a peaceful cafe at night, but in book form.

(I say 80s ballad since it's NOT for everyone. In fact, 80s ballad feels like one of those things that people tend to dislike about the 80s....feels fitting for this book, honestly, since people are mixed or feeling conflicted about it despite their enjoyment or dislike!)

Neverthless, it's still a unique light read for a rainy day, or a wistful night at the cafe. It did say what it wanted to say pretty well.

We all wax poetic about fixing our present and future but what if we get to do it? What are we going to say? What are we going to feel? How are we going to look at our past, even? And if the present can't be changed, what's it all for, then? This book gives nice insights about this dilemma without having to worry about pesky concepts such as 'grandfather paradox' or 'time crash'.

Ultimately this is why I still liked this book despite the glaring faults. The premise is really good, and with the right writing, it could be something amazing (Celine Sciamma has proven that it could, after all!) and heartfelt. The story's approach to time travel is still something pretty rare, and the almost-anthological nature of the series makes me sure that there are better stories in the sequels.

Reading that the sequels gets better and better makes me excited to dive more into Cafe Funiculi Funicula and eventually, Cafe Donna Donna.

Take a sip, and go back to the past. Say what you want....say your feelings.....before the coffee gets cold.

When love breaks down, the things we do, to stop the truth from hurting you. When love breaks down, the lies we tell, they only serve to fool ourselves.

....Overall, I had a good time in the unique coffeehouse that is Cafe Funiculi Funicula. This was a pretty difficult review since I rarely write book reviews.

I'm off to read the second book, while imagining what I'd do if I could go back before the coffee gets cold....

[First posted on Tumblr in April 14, 2024]

#BookReview #BeforeTheCoffeeGetsCold #CafeFuniculiFunicula #ToshikazuKawaguchi #review

David and Lisa (1962) is one of such films. Carrying profundity and heart towards the then-taboo subject of mental health with care humanity at the time where the subject was looked down upon is a reason for this film to be remembered today.

However, there's more than heart in this underrated film, in that it tells us about life, death, love, and growth.

(note: NG means Not Good — the opposite of OK)

Even before the New Hollywood era of American cinema, the early-1960s was already a time period of challenges in the world of celluloid dark rooms. Films such as The Apartment (1960) and A Child is Waiting (1963) were challenging the world of American cinema with portrayals of mental health and mental problems that are sympathetic to the subjects with these conditions and does not demonize them or painting them as 'scary'.

David and Lisa (1962) nests among those films. Directed by Frank Perry —– who would later direct the infamous Mommie Dearest (1981) —– and written by his then-partner Eleanor, based on the book Jordi/Lisa and David by Theodore Isaac Rubin, it tells the story of David Clemens (Keir Dullea), a 16-year-old teenager with fear of being touched. David is being admitted in a psychiatric hospital by his mother with hopes that the hospital and Dr. Swinford (Howard da Silva) will bring David to a cure. However, David remains withdrawn from the other patients and Dr. Swinford until he caught the attention of Lisa Brandt (Janet Margolin), a girl with two personalities; Lisa — who can only speak in rhymes, and Muriel — a mute. Slowly, both gets drawn to each other and opens up to their issues.

Right from the start, it is clear that the film isn't seeking to be a 'scary' tale of mentally unwell people, but to humanise them. The lovely score by Mark Lawrence gives the film a feeling of melancholia mixed with teen melodrama right at the beginning. This tone stays consistent throughout the film, and while it gives off the feeling of 'teen melodrama', it is quite effective in capturing emotions.

The portrayal of mental illness and treatments of mental illness among teenagers certainly deviated from the stereotypes and stigmas associated to it from the 1960s. It is certainly no One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975), as David and Lisa (1962) instead focuses on the humanity of these young people with problems, and framing it as an coming-of-age story heightened the humanity present in the film, and arguably, makes the film ahead of its time, and yet, even today, this film still manages to be more respectful on portrayals of teenage mental issues, even managing to portray the topic of generational trauma —– that the world of (western) cinema has recently picked up lately. One noticeable trait of this film is how the teenagers act —– they're not 'crazy teenagers', they're simply teenagers with problems. Again, it's less One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975), and more West Side Story (1961) from the natural way the teens act with distinct personalities (especially Carlos, played by Jaime Sanchez).

Ultimately, this film focuses on David whose fear of being touched is portrayed as a result of generational trauma as his mother recalls her harsh life and how it affects her way of raising David and wanting David to appear respectable and 'normal', resulting in David seeing a touch as something that forces him to conform to the image of respectability, and manifested into him not wanting to be touched to avoid inheriting his mother's generational trauma. Which unfortunately can be mistaken as Freudian manifestation stemming from his feelings towards his mother for viewers who are unfamiliar with the concept of generational trauma.

Notably, David starts the film as a child with a fear of death (what his fear of touch is about) and as the film goes, we see him become accustomed to life, and goes from merely living to being alive. In the end we see David actually alive, which is what this film's thesis is ultimately about: What being alive actually is David and Lisa approaches the subject through the love story between the haunted-by-death David and the living-but-sheltered Lisa where both of them finally gets over their issues together and grow up.

Another notable aspect of David and Lisa is the way the film discusses David's fear of death through the theme of the linear nature of time and inevitability gives the film an almost Ingmar Bergman-ish sensibilities, complete with the natural black-and-white photography that gives the film a similar feeling to Bergman's earlier input from 1950s, with David and Lisa having a similar look and feel to Bergman's Summer With Monika (1953) in particular, although this film is sprinkled with fantastical visuals of the clock-guillotine dream that adds a whimsical quality to it. Previously, I have described this film as closer to West Side Story (1961) but this film felt like what if 1950s Ingmar Bergman did something similar to West Side Story (1961) as a drama.

As far as the acting goes, the melodramatic tone does a good favor for the actors in this film. But in particular, Keir Dullea's performance might appear to be 'robotic', but he gave David an interesting growth in that he went from being insufferably 'less emotional' to endearing without being exaggerated. David has a really precise diction, calculated movement, and a certain kind of rigidity that hides his inner pain and closes the path to his soul through the way Dullea portrays David with his expressive eyes (the windows to David's soul —– the only path that is open to others) that could tell many emotions from slight movements, and as the film goes, David becomes more open in his emotions and pain in subtle changes in body motions and expressions without changing too much, it feels that his calculated movements accommodates to his changing openness to emotions. He feels complementary to Lisa's bubbly personality instead of clashing with her as a result. Also the way David talks and shouts feels oddly prescient of the behaviours of Gen Z teens on social media. It is a performance with purpose that feels rewarding, and is clear why this was Dullea's breakout role that established him as an exciting new talent at the time.

Similarly, Janet Margolin felt as she was born to play the role. Her natural beauty works well for the rougher-edged Lisa, and same goes for her performance, she never felt like a 'Manic Pixie Dream Girl' as we clearly see her flaws and how she grows out from it, while hoping that David will come through. She looks like a friend you'd have in real life. Margolin not only plays Lisa sympathetically, but she portrays Lisa's glowing heart in a natural, non-artificial (or exaggerated cuteness) way.

The supporting cast, as previously mentioned before, realistically act much like actual teenagers that heightens the setting. While there are criticisms of how the characters felt a little bit like 'spectacles', this film does remind you that the characters are teenagers. Teenagers acts like that, and David and Lisa felt that the expressive aspect of teenagers is well-shown. Everything about David and Lisa felt alive and 'lived' as a result, giving the impression of the viewer as 'living' with the characters. Special mention to Howard da Silva who portrays Dr. Swinford with full grace and affection that tells us that the children in the psychiatric hospital are well-loved as human beings with actual lives. Another mention to make is Simon, played by Matthew Anden, who provides queer subtext (per the usual for 1960s American films) via his affection for David being more than a friendly affection as evidenced in him wanting David to be friends, with his dismissal of Lisa being a feeling of slight jealousy.

The weakness of David and Lisa, despite the very strong qualities it has —— is the lack of focus on Lisa. This might be attributed to the fact that the original book did not focus on her. While Lisa is given her own story of growing up and opening herself up to others after a long time of isolation all for love (David living in her system!) and care (there is a subtle motif that alludes to this throughout the film), there's still something lacking about Lisa, despite the wonderful performance by Janet Margolin.

Still, David and Lisa remains a strong, wonderful, and heartful work deserving of a second chance that dared to show something 'new' at the time as normal and loving. It is full of heart, wants you to see a reality unseen, feel the reality and step out from the cages of the facade of 'respectability' (a.k.a the illusion of 'normality'). This is a film deserving of a Criterion Collection release, although you can watch this film for free (with ads) in TUBI.

Although forgotten for years, this film acts as a sort-of precursor in the genre of dramas that deals with young people with mental health and mental illness set in psychiatric hospitals such as Girl, Interrupted (1999), I'm A Cyborg, But That's OK (2006) from famed director Park Chan-wook, It's A Kind of Funny Story (2010), The Perks of Being a Wallflower (2012), and most recently in 2023, the music video for OMG by NewJeans (which has unintentional parallels to David and Lisa).

David and Lisa eventually don't let eachother go, they're right there for eachother 24....

#film #Review #OdysseyOfMichiru #OMG #NewjeansNeverDie

A Life time comes and goes.. And my friend the rose Told me this morning At dawn I was born, Baptized with the dew, I blossomed.

Happy and in love The sun shined through And by the night time I was old

My friend the rose told me that time destroys everything. Time will bring things to irreversible decay, and all we can see is who will leave first, and what will be left behind.

But the true tragedy is how will someone leave. Which ones leave first? Those whose bodies decompose first, or those whose minds decompose first before their body? If life is a dream (within a dream), then this tragedy turns it into a nightmare. As this is inevitable in our lives, then life is inherently a nightmare.

Gaspar Noé once again shows how time generates a nightmare. This is not a love story, this is a suffocating, devastating look at the inevitable —– the decay of life. The wilting of the rose.

A Life time comes and goes… And my friend the rose Told me this morning See the God who Made me Bow my head, I feel I’m falling now

Yes, I’m falling now My heart is almost bare, My feet is in the grave, Already I’m no longer there.

One thing that people often forgot is that Noé can be profound —– Enter the Void is about how important the lives of others are to our lives. One should take a look at Noé's short SIDA to see how profound he can go, especially when it comes to decaying bodies.

Even though Noé drops the things he's most notorious for, that is sex, violence, and sensory abuse, Vortex is as harsh, suffocating, realistic, and difficult as his more notorious works. At the very least, Enter The Void ended with a rebirth after all that death and decay. That does not happen in Vortex.

Once life decays, it will continue to decay. Until the heart goes bare, feet on the grave.

The decaying life is shown with tenderness and slowness, bringing Jeanne Dielman (1975) in mind, with all it's intensity over something 'off' in everyday life. The fact that the wife is stricken with Dementia will make you find something 'wrong' in every scene, be it a small detail that she missed, or a big screw-up, and it all only goes downhill. Things go wrong scene after scene after scene, making you feel that their lives will end very soon with all the decay and withering.

Even though this film is slow, with unshowy scenes and realistic performances, you can still feel pain permeating through the screens for the entire runtime. You know that they are decaying, you know that their lives will end.

The wife's dementia gives way to the tragedy of decay: who leaves, who dies, who sees your (suffering) story. Dementia is the mind leaving life itself, but it also rejects the inevitable, as it returns the mind to the point before the decay and loss. It is in a sense, a vortex that affects everything badly. And that's a whole another tragedy: To remember those who left us as if they're alive.....after leaving them while they're alive, as if they do not exist. It is essentially life itself fighting against the inevitable end.

But in the end, all must go. After all, life is a dream. We must wake up when it ends.

Now that we got that out of the way, let's get to the style. It is very, very much a Gaspar Noé film, just without sensory abuse this time. It is him, stripped down to the basics, very minimal. The trademark Benoit Debie camerawork is as vivid and lush as ever —– reds and yellows has never looked good together before. It is still a nice film to look at.

The split-screen is also brilliant as it showcases another layer of thematic presentation: Lui and his wife is so apart in their decays that they're essentially not having the same life that they shared together. It is a sign of decay, above all. It is far from a gimmick, and the usage is much better than in Lux Aeterna. (while it is still used to show chaotic situations like in Lux Aeterna)

The ones who can believe Me, I need to hope Otherwise I ‘m nothing

A Life time comes and goes That’s what my friend the rose Said only yesterday…

• “Mon amie la rose” by Francoise Hardy

Vortex is everything. It is about the end, the decay that preceeded it, the fear of your loved ones leaving you (and even worse —– their minds leaving before their body), and how time destroys everything.

Alternate Titles: Inevitable, Kukira Kau Rumah

#review #writeup #Letterboxd #GasparNoe

David Clemens - David and Lisa (1962)

He has an interesting growth in that he went from being insufferable to endearing without being exaggerated. David has a really precise diction, calculated movement, and a certain kind of rigidity that hides his inner pain through the way Keir portrays David with his expressive eyes that could tell many emotions from slight movements, and as the film goes, David becomes more open in his emotions and pain in subtle changes in body motions and expressions without changing too much, it feels that his calculated movements accommodates to his changing openness to emotions.

He feels complementary to Lisa's bubbly personality instead of clashing with her as a result. Also the way David talks and shouts feels oddly prescient of the behaviours of Gen Z teens on social media, that's a bonus. (speaking as a Gen Z myself)

Steven Lake - Bunny Lake is Missing (1965)

The thing is that even though Steven presents himself as this charming, seemigly-trusty person, his eyes says otherwise, but clouds his true intentions behind his 'helpful' acts to find Bunny, and feels that he's trying to get both Ann and the audience to trust him. Even though this didn't really work due these acts obviously being him trying to cover up his true intentions, there's still a tinge of shock when he revealed himself as the baddie.

As previously described in the previous section Keir's eyes can do a lot, and it really shows in here with how easy it looks for Steven to completely switch his 'mode' from 'charming and composed' to a complete psycho just through eyes and sudden change in body motion.

It is jarring, yet effective and sends you shivers. You can see this in the final sequence as Steven quickly switches his 'little boy' playfulness to again, complete psycho in a switch.

This character felt like a precursor to baddies with suspiciously charming facade in modern thrillers, particularly Park Chan-wook films like Oldboy (2003), Stoker (2013), and Decision to Leave (2022) – which is why I highly recommend checking out his works if you love Bunny Lake is Missing. Same goes for people who like Park Chan-wook, Bunny Lake is Missing feels like a prototype to Park's films and that's why you should watch it.

Paul Grenfel - The Fox (1967)

I really did not expect Paul to not be overtly-condescendingly evil at all, given what The Fox is about. Like Steven, Paul is presented as seemingly harmless, charming even as you get to know him at first. But he's completely repulsive and chauvinistic at the same time. Through eyes and body movements, Keir makes Paul both charming and dislikeable at the same time. It helps that Keir's lower-than-usual voice he used for Paul really brought Paul's malice and desire for dominance forward. As my friend puts it: “His eyes in this movie in particular were incredibly striking, like swords stabbing through you. And his body language definitely put me off several times throughout!”

This also makes Paul dangerous, because he doesn't present himself as a straight-up asshole. You'd expect him to straight up be insulting to Jill but instead, he shows his attempts to dominate the women using stares, expressions, body movements, and the low tone of his voice instead of visible anger to affect and hurt them.His conversation with Jill manages to still be insulting without going straight to actual insults, just through Paul's eyes and condescending tone. You can really feel his dislike of Jill displaying HIS qualities (and subsequently, Jill's role as March's partner) and his anger towards March seeing him as 'an experiment'. He feels like the personification of the malicious Fox spirit from Eastern folklore who preys on people.

The film itself is great. It was pretty ahead of it's time.....and arguably still worth a watch today, since some aspects are still pretty forward, such as the idea that sexuality is a spectrum —– March strikes as someone through a bisexual awakening through a sexual encounter with a man, remembering that bisexuality as an idea was almost unheard of in 1967 (in the West, at least).

Dave Bowman - 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)

When I first saw this film as a teen, I actually thought that Dave is a real astronaut from how realistic he acts. Dave is very professional and handles everything like you would expect real-life astronauts handles things (that's why he appears as machinelike)

This doesn't make Dave 'fully unemotional' though, as his face tells the emotions, as is his careful body movements. I have to remind people that Dave isn't given time to grief and cry over Frank's death and the Monolith, he must take serious action to handle it. Even then, you can tell from his eyes and twitches of his lips that he's struck with serious emotions over it. He even sounds like trying to hold back anger when HAL confronts him. Keir plays Dave like actual trained astronauts who are careful and not letting emotions take over him, but at the same time, his graceful body movements makes Dave appear balletic and ethereal (which fits with how 2001 is an operatic film), and it's wonderful.

This is what people tend to not see in 2001: Dave might be 'mechanic' and 'machinelike' (as Keir himself agreed), but to really see his expressions...you'd have to see his eyes, lips, eyebrows...they move accordingly, even twitches on reaction. There's even a little moment where he smiles after he closes the airlock!

Read more on my insights on Keir's performance and the entire film here.

Rick Dylan - Paperback Hero (1973)

The film's tagline of “Every woman's had one....every man's been one....once” is very accurate. My biggest praise for this film is how the character of Rick, a young man trapped in his 'tough-guy' persona who thinks he's 'cool' and 'macho' like the Big Guns in the old west, is portrayed as realistically exasperating, annoying, and worrying.

Rick feels like an adolescent grappling in his cowboy fantasies and when confronted with the reality that he doesn't live in the ideal world of the old west (in other words, he needs to grow up), he instead doubles down on his cowboy delusions, becomes violent (lashes out to the 'Enemy'), and loses his identity in the process. Keir's usual strength of emotional eyes, body motions, and precise tone actually makes Rick sounds both like a cowboy and a (man)child at the same time, and he did a great job for not making Rick romanticised. Rick is real, but his cowboy persona isn't.

I have to point out that Keir normally don't play characters like this, and he still does it pretty well!

#film #review #OdysseyOfMichiru

What if Isolation and Repetition brings comfort? And what if those are the only escape from hard times?

Our everyday lives are often repetitive that we sometimes find crushingly boring, meaningless, and less-than-alive. It is a cycle that keeps repeating. A seamless system of repetitions.

Wake up, eat, go to work, go home, shower, eat, sleep.

Such is life under capitalism.

But at times, repetition is the only comfort we can have in a troubled world. In a world where we cannot control a lot of things to our comfort, the controlled repetition of everyday life can be an escape from the uncontrollable, constantly-changing external lives of us.

Dreariness and Repetition is a thing we can comfortably expect and control. It’s easy to handle workdays without new things, because we know what will happen, and we know how we will handle it.

We have autonomy in repetition. We have freedom in isolation. Isolation brings us comfort.

But what if the repetition breaks down? Will we be glad or angry

Trigger Warnings: Suicide mention, Suicidal Ideation, COVID-19 Mentions

Enter Jeanne Dielman, 23, Quai du Commerce 1080 Bruxelles (1975), a film by Chantal Akerman. Widely known for its’ soul-crushing length of three hours and twelve minutes that consists of a woman doing her chores with no music, minimal dialogue, and snail’s pace. It is considered a rite of passage for both cinephiles and film students for this reason alone. It is THE quintessential “boring European movie”.

All we see in the three hour runtime is just a woman doing her chores and housework.

Wake up, make bed, eat breakfast, tidy up home, groceries, stare at the void, shower, eat dinner, meet client, sleep.

That is all what we see in the movie. The life of Jeanne Dielman. Nothing more, nothing less. For three full hours. The title itself is literally her home address!

it is minimalism taken to the realistic extreme. It forces you to think, it forces you to focus, and it forces you to feel. Because this is reality.

The slow pacing makes all the scenes where Jeanne Dielman does her chores feels longer and more true to reality. A good chunk of 30-40 minutes is dedicated to scenes of her cooking. It’s not like in cooking shows where we see cooking in a quick way, we see cooking in real time. Boringly.

Even bathing scenes feels like a chore thanks to the pacing and filmmaking style. Yes, we see Jeanne Dielman strip naked and wash herself, but the pacing makes it felt like an actual chore.

Because such is life. It is full of boring repetitive chores.

Even when other people comes to the screen such as her son and ‘clients’ only reinforces the loneliness and isolationist life of Jeanne Dielman, since they all have very minimal dialogue of mundane things.

“How was school?”, “Eh, fine i guess. Skipped PE to meet someone”, “Don’t do that”, “Okay Mom, but I was with a friend”, “Alright, let’s continue reading”, “Okay”

Nothing fancy. Just a mother and her school-aged son. Just another chore. In Jeanne Dielman’s life, conversation is just a chore.

Fortunately, it’s not all boring chores in house. We see Jeanne Dielman go out and do things like shopping for groceries, go to bank, and go to a nice cafe.

It’s scenes like this that makes us appreciate the little things in life. The little trips to minimarkets, the cafes we frequently go to, the roads we travel. It’s what makes everyday life bearable, it’s kind of like what Studio Ghibli movies does to you, but in a more realistic way.

And even then we get a little backstory and personality on Jeanne. She has a penchant for attention to detail, shows signs of perfectionism, had a late husband who died, lives with her teenaged son alone, has a sister in Canada, works as an occasional babysitter and a prostitute when her son isn’t around. We can see that Jeanne Dielman is having a hard time in her life outside of isolation. And it’s possible that she sees her dreary life as an escape.

It’s a brutally isolated repetitive life for Jeanne Dielman. And arguably, she is purposefully isolating herself from her implied terrible reality.

But at the same time, she finds comfort, control, and agency in her calculated, and isolated everyday life.

Because ultimately, she can control her life. This is the life that makes her feel like herself. Free of other people and external threats from controlling her.

But it doesn’t last forever for her. While the first two (of three) days depicted in the movie shows a carefully-constructed, scheduled. clean, and controlled everyday life, the third day is where things breaks down. The repetition breaks. She is forced to get out from isolation.

And Jeanne Dielman does not like it.

Her details disappears.

A potato drops, a shoe drops, a button in a clothing is gone and you can’t find the exact same button after going to three tailors. There is a level of anger that you could feel in the smallest of mistakes in your life. There’s nothing more annoying than seeing a clothing…missing a button. There’s nothing more terrible than not being able to find the exact same button for the outfit. Now the outfit looks shitty forever.

Have you ever had your days ruined from smallest of mistakes? This film shows it in subtle detail through Delphine Seyrig’s face and movements as Jeanne Dielman loses control of her life. The thesis of this part of the movie is: One mistake sometimes ruins the entire day, and Chantal Akerman portrays it realistically.

Mistakes in life makes agency in life slowly disappearing. And it does not stop there. In the span of hours, foods are getting overcooked, usual coffee tastes bad (the screenshot shows her having to brew a coffee from scratch because she’s pissed over it),

Then her favourite table at the cafe is occupied.

It’s small, but you can feel the crushing betrayal over it. It’s like someone is taking away your friend from you. And the other seat don’t feel as good as the usual. We all definitely felt betrayed over smallest stuff like that in our lives. And to top it all off, your favourite waitress that usually asks you for orders and knows your favourite menus are not there.

Does it felt like something is leaving you behind? Yes.

Your comfort is leaving you behind, and forces you to get out. But the thing is, you are comfortable, and content with the repetitive comfort. It’s the only thing you can have, and you can’t have it suddenly.

Jeanne Dielman’s life is suddenly changing to a direction she does not expect, nor want to.

The last minutes of the movie now shows her job – prostitution. She must service a john. And a john gets serviced indeed. But something is wrong: Jeanne Dielman feels pleasure from her job.

She felt pleasure from the job that wasn’t meant to give you pleasure. Throughout the movie, we see her “job” being…..just another job. Just something to get bread in her mouth. No pleasure, no hate. A job.

But feeling pleasure in a job where you normally won’t….that’s also an unwanted change in life.

Jeanne Dielman’s comfort zone changes, but…..her carefully-constructed life is being taken away.

In the last minute, we see her life being taken away. For Jeanne Dielman, a person whose life got taken away previously, this is an unwelcome change. Her dreary life now no longer gives comfort

It is happening again. And this time, she can’t go back to her previous dreary life. She WILL want a different life, and it’s unfair.

And what happens next is her last attempt to reclaim her dreary life that has gave her comfort and agency.

She murders the john. To her, he is taking her life away. And she doesn’t want it to happen. Therefore, he is responsible for taking away her comfort zone.

Now, how would you reclaim your comfort zone?

This is the question that Chantal Akerman asks us, to understand Jeanne Dielman’s desperate action. But the next scene shows that she is never getting her life back.

She must go.

And fade to black. The life of Jeanne Dielman ends.

That is all you see in the three-hour-and-twelve-minutes runtime. Nothing really happens, but something is building up, only to crash in the last minutes. This move is boring, but it asks you to see. It asks you to notice. It asks you to feel.

It is technically, an action movie. In that the action is in you. The uninterrupted 7-minute shot of Jeanne Dielman bleeding to death in an attempt to commit suicide made me think.

What would you do when Change brings pain? Would you revert to nothingness?

As I am typing this, I am currently having carpal tunnel syndrome on both hands. So, not being able to do anything forced me to find something to occupy my ADHD-brain with.

And yet, I chose this film. On paper, this should be a nightmare for me who has ADHD and therefore continously losing focus. Yeah, I did lost focus few times. But I spent more time focusing.

Because this is just what people call, life

I had a bad event that resulted in a months-long grief in 2015. What I did not talk about was how my days went.

In the days following it, it was all mundane. Nothing exciting, just me at home, doing chores, and occasional succumbs to dark thoughts and depression. And crying myself to sleep.

I reverted to dreariness. To escape from grief.

My routine was boring, but it might have helped me to become numb from the pain. I’ve become more numb to anything thanks to everyday of boring, mundane life. I’ve begun to think that being at home, in dreary life is comfort. Better than the scary world of the outside. (No, I am NOT being a Hikikomori)

But it’s the reason why I am still alive to this day. I found comfort in dreariness. Dreariness lets me revert to a place where nothing changes. Even when i succumb to dark thoughts, nothing bad will happen. Dreariness was escapism for me.

Technically, I have died. And this dreariness is just where my ghost live in. This repetitive life is peaceful.

Repetition brings comfort when variance brings pain.

Some time ago, I attempted to add variance in my dreary work-from-home life by doing fun drawings. All it did was giving me Carpal Tunnel Syndrome. Maybe it’s my body screaming “No, I don’t want this. Stay living a mundane life, please” While it will go away, I wonder, is variance in life an 'invasion’ to comfort?

Is repetition truly a comfort zone?

While I thought about it, I thought about this pandemic. Isolation is what keeps us alive. As long as we all stay at home, staying true to our dreary life as comfort from a pandemic.

“Staying home saves lives” indeed.

I have stayed home for the rest of 2020 and 2021. The outside world is bad. And isolating myself brings a small amount of peace. Small, but peace none the less. It is what repetition brings. Dreariness helped me move on from the many disasters around me.

Then as I am writing this, Something happened.

My life suddenly changed for the worse drastically, in a way that I might be losing my current comfortable mundane life. I don’t want to lose it. Let’s hope that I won’t lose it. Again, I wonder, are changes in life 'invasion’ to comfort?

Is reverting to dreariness and repetition a way to stop the pain in change?

The question keeps ringing in my head. And the ending of the film stays in my mind. What if I lose my current dreariness that is my comfort? Find a new repetition, they said. But I persist. It’s like a person being taken away from you. You don’t look for replacement.

How will I able to reclaim it? What should I do when reverting to dreariness becomes impossible?

Maybe the answer should remain unanswered. As long as we stay at home. As long as we make dreariness an escape from reality.

#review #writeup #Letterboxd #serious #confessional #ChantalAkerman

shunji iwai is an independent japanese filmmaker specializing in dreamy melancholia. despite that, he has worked in many genres, although he is most popular for directing the coming-of-age hits all about lily chou-chou (2001) and hana & alice (2004).

these are several short musings on his films in one post.

fireworks, should we see it from the side or bottom? (1993) (tv movie)

even in tv budget and form, shunji iwai still delivers. nostalgic and surprisingly emotional.

fireworks don't last forever. just like children. their innocence and sincerity will blow into ashes as they grow old. fireworks are colorful, just like childhood. childhood is a burst of color that will become ashes.

this is what this film is. that momentary euphoria, wonder, and melancholia in seeing the seriousness in trivialities of life, and seeing the trivialities in seriousness of life.

the fireworks festival might be mundane for an adult, but to a kid it's as big deal as something like someone's wedding: it must be great, nice, and perfect. and therefore they must prepare to see it. adults do not feel this way anymore, but children feel the euphoria. because at that age, something like 'are fireworks flat or round' and 'we should elope to tokyo' are equally the same in the eyes of a child.

and in the end, they must choose the answer that will affirm their lives. this is a surprisingly good coming-of-age film. this easily beats out any made-for-tv movies in existence.

so, are fireworks flat or round? should i see it from the side or the bottom?

love letter (1995)

how are you? i'm fine

i'm at loss for words....i don't know what to say. This started off as a really twee young-adult drama but the second half got me in tears....the grief, longing, clinging, all felt real.

it's so tempting to send letters to people who are no longer here. i know i do. and i wish i could do that. i don't know if i want someone to respond to it though....

when you had memories that shaped you as a person, it's so hard to let go —— you cling onto whatever's left in your memories. other people's memories of your memories becomes a refuge from longing and grief. this is....beautiful.

helps that i do like the name 'fujii itsuki'. 'fujii' is one of my favourite surnames of all time from any language/culture, and 'fujii itsuki' is a tight name. so unique and yet normal. hearing people say 'fujii itsuki' is music to my ears. I don't know what i'm talking about....i just like the sound of the name. naturally when the name comes up, emotions fill me.

so cold yet so warm, only shunji iwai can make something like this. this is a masterwork in romance, mood, and atmosphere, along with editing and cinematography.

wonderful, i never wanted this to end. i want to see more of them.

everything about this film is both sad and comforting. shunji iwai is a great director.

april story (1998)

longing makes you try for new things. longing gets you to place full of strangers. somewhere far from home.....because you wish for that longing to bloom into home.

like cherry blossoms, everything blooms. musashino in uzuki's eye is a flower she wants to see bloom into her. and so musashino becomes a flower she tends. most of the film is just uzuki getting used to musashino, a place where she longs for something, and then musashino bloomed on her, getting her closer to her longing. the last part of the movie is just wonderful.

shunji iwai takes us to a dreamy trip and plays with our emotions, as usual. and he's just great at it.

#review #writeup #DirectorSpeedrun #ShunjiIwai #Letterboxd

is the internet truly artificial when real life is so artificial that it becomes an awaking dream? when real life no longer needs us, can we turn to the internet to find others who need us?

shunji iwai asks those questions in his 3-hour dreamy epic a bride for rip van winkle (2016), through the nomadic journey of a woman in the artficial city of tokyo...and her attempts bring realness in her life through internet.

(note: the all lowercase writing is an intentional choice for my writings about shunji iwai. it just fits with his films)

underneath the massive buildings of Tokyo, it's all loneliness with a lack of connection. nowadays it is truly difficult to find meaningful relationships, and as a result, we often become nomadic in search of people to connect to, often through social media. It sucks, it really does. a “nomadland”, if you may.

the worst part of these nomadic search for love and companionship is just as you think you found the one, they're gone.

do we actually need eachother?

a bride for rip van winkle wonderfully illustrates the frustrating attempts to be needed by other people. nanami is a nomad, both literally and figuratively, as she looks for home when she does not have one, and looks for people who need her, and people she can need. and most of it are frustratingly harsh. she uses the internet to find meaningful connections as real life took her one meaningful connection away. and she got it, but real life finds a way to ruin it.

If all about lily chou-chou (2001) is about how the internet (stan culture, to be exact) provides escape from the real world that does not understand us through shared love of an artist, thena bride for rip van winkle is about how we use the internet to attempt to add 'reality' to our artificial looking reality through finding connections with other people in it.

shunji iwai is as profound with the internet in 2016 as he was back in 2001. granted, the interwebs in 2016 is another world compared to what it was in 2001, but one thing remains: the internet is a place to escape from loneliness.

Even the tokyo setting works, nothing screams 'fake' and 'full of (metaphorical) masks' than tokyo. people come to tokyo to get by and get bread after all, not to make friends. and how do we cope with the fakeness and artificiality of real life? the internet. when compared to real life, the internet feels less artificial by comparison. and then the artificality of real life becomes a dream.

the usage of classical music is wonderful, heightens the emotion and themes, as well as enhancing shunji iwai's trademark dreamy tone of the film. It says something when air on the g-string is used in the climax, where classical music —– symbol of formality —– playing in the background of informality and shattered masks shows what people truly are. informal, draped in formal curtains, desperate to take off formalities in a world that is indifferent to them no matter how formal they are.

the characters of nanami and mashiro are great —— characters who can't fit the formalities of tokyo, who needed figurative masks to live, as the most symphathetic and meaningful ones in the story, which also informs the film's theme of 'formalities' that we must mask ourselves in just to get by.

amuro (who owns a company named 'aznable' —— shunji iwai definitely ships char/amuro), himself is a complex person. we don't really know if his intentions are actually genuine, or even good, but it says a lot about us. as long as we can find connection through people like amuro, so be it.

shunji iwai knows what people are like on the internet age, and the artificiality of reality as time went on. an awaking dream where you are aimlessly wandering, wishing for a long sleep to wake up in a hopefully better future.

wanted: a bride for rip van winkle he is alone....a bride will alleviate his loneliness, at the very least

p.s: go in this film blind. don't look up synopsis or w/e. Just go with the flow.

#review #writeup #DirectorSpeedrun #ShunjiIwai #Letterboxd