Vonia Maborosi (Japanese: Maboroshi no Hikari (Phantasmic Light)) (1995) Director: Hirokazu Koreeda Watched: February 2018 Rating: 6/10 This is a film of contradictions. To begin with, everything I love about the film seems eerily reminiscent of my cons list. Koreeda uses darkness to show the light in life. It is death that eventually forces renewal. The plot is simple. Yumiko is but a young bride when her husband, an ostensibly cheerful Ikuo, supposedly commits suicide. She is told that he deliberately walked in front of a train, but the body is unidentifiable. Yumiko, only 25, is left with a newborn son, Yuichi. She quickly falls victim to a dark depression, even neglecting Yuichi. Eventually, a matchmaker friend arranges a marriage with a widower and his daughter in a faraway seaside town. Cheerlessly, Yumiko moves from her home in Osaka to begin life anew. We watch as she struggles to find life again. Yumiko, the star of our show, is played by real-life model Makiko Esumi. Even so, Koreeda does not flaunt this. In fact, he does the opposite- obscuring her with angles and shadows. Much of the film is carried by her facial expressions and superb performance. For example, when the older woman returns, alive, from being lost in the storm, you can almost feel Yumiko's bitterness. When the knock comes after many hours of waiting- an uncannily similar situation to the one she gets in regards to the late husband- you can see in her otherwise expressionless face that she expects the same bad news. Koreeda chooses not to show her face for a while, and when he does, her expression is not one of relief or pleasure. The cinematography is gorgeous. Local fishing town, the sea. Countryside. Weather. Long hallways. Dark rooms. Stairs. Trains. Windows. Koreeda's idol was Ozu. This is obvious to anyone who knows the director. Tatami shots. Very little dialogue. Minimal use of music. Too much pretty, not enough brains? Inside scenes are all bleak and dark. One scene was fifty seconds of complete darkness, as we waited for Yumiko to let in light from a window. Most scenes filmed inside are cloaked in darkness and shadows. In fact, when I first started watching, I thought there was something wrong with the version I was watching, the quality seemed so low. But I guess it was simply the film Koreeda used and the effect he wanted to have. It also might have been the version in this country. Does this make it beautiful, though? The pacing is not ideal. Some parts interesting, but overall this is not something you watch expecting to be enthralled. Its merits are inconspicuous, its charm subdued. This is all true, up to a point. Part of honing a craft is knowing when more is not better; acknowledging that some things must be left on the cutting room floor, no matter how precious. Unlike his later films, where Koreeda finesses this skill, he seems to get carried away here. Whereas his mentor Ozu would have similarly long silences and shots, they held meaning. Here, the camera often stays focused a moment too long- and for no other reason than it might be pretty. Similarly, angles are practiced that serve no purpose in furthering the film. As prepossessing as it is, at some point, it became superfluous.and considerably disadvantageous. From the final scene, a long shot (not only in angle, but also in length): "I just. I just don't understand. Why did he kill himself? Why was he walking along the tracks? It just goes around and around in my head why do you think he did it?" "The sea has the power to beguile. Back when Dad was still fishing, he saw a maborosi- a strange light- far out to sea. Something in it was beckoning to him, he said. It happens to all of us." Well, what is a maborosi? Actually spelled "Maboroshi", literally "phantasmic light", but best translated as "a trick of the light". It is most often used as a metaphor for chasing a ghost in your past; mental ghosts. From what I understand, a charmingly untranslatable word. And when we understand this, the beauty of this film is that much more appreciated. Because that is what embodies the entire film. Through its simplicity, one must make the effort to understand its message. A film about trying to understand the inexplicable, but finding out that sometimes some things must be left unexplained. There is a serenity in accepting this; in finding the silver lining. #FilmReview #Koreeda

Jennifer Lynx When I first started on the path to learn about cinema, a friend noticed and started giving helpful suggestions and useful information. He also gifted me a copy of "Maborosi" (1995), by Kore-eda Hirokazu, known in the US as Hirokazu Koreeda. I finally found the right time to sit down and watch this film, and all I can say is, what a beautiful gift it was.This film is a work of art, a slow painting of light and shadow, of the play of seasons, and the journey one young woman makes from joy in life to sorrow in death and back again, sort of. Ikuo and Yomiko are childhood friends who grow up together, get married, and start a family. Through a tragic accident, Ikuo is killed and Yomiko and her infant son must go on without him. She remarries and attempts to find answers to her unanswerable questions in an isolated seaside village with another widower and his young daughter.There is poetry in the cinematography of this movie and this story. There is symmetry and slow, rhythmic movement, extreme long shots, many with no movement at all. They give one a moment to pause and reflect. It is completely opposite the whirlwind we call life of alarms, and soccer practices, and time cards, and business lunches. "Maborosi" has very little dialogue, but it works because words aren't always necessary or even desired. There are shared moments, looks between one another, glimpses of daily life, the sounds of the surf, and a few words which go a long way. Stairs, trains, and windows are predominant themes. It is a fascinating glimpse into rural Japanese culture. Finally, the soundtrack is brilliant and is the perfect emotional backdrop to the story. It was so sad, but not without moments of hope. I'll definitely revisit this gem.

Pierre Radulescu The story is told with a large economy of words, of actions, of images: it is a supremely ascetic film. The people are always in the distance, the images always in the dark. The only images that are clear are the scenes remembered by the protagonist: the woman that lost her first spouse.It is a very radical cinematographic approach. I would say that it cannot be more radical than that. It is the movie from the mind of the protagonist.But if you have the guts to follow this ascetic movie you'll be generously rewarded. Because it is actually an exquisite artwork. Yes, many images are left in obscurity: it is actually a great play of light and obscure. As for the images that have meaning for the protagonist, the camera is in such moments like caressing the whole: the scenery becomes then pure visual choreography.

Alli Antar I rarely watch the same movie more than once, but this one was so beautiful, I simply had to watch it again, paying full price to see it on the big screen each time. What I love the most about this film is the way that director Hirokazu Kore-Eda captures nature and humans as part of it, perhaps most eloquently portrayed by the scene in which rain drops on a window frame the face of the grief-stricken stoic-countenanced protagonist. The film begins with the story of a little girl's loss of her grandmother, and continues on with the story of the same little girl, now a young woman and the film's protagonist, whose life is again dramatically altered by the sudden death of her husband. Throughout the film, as a way of coping with the loss, she attempts to understand why he killed himself. My favorite scene in the film occurs near the end, when the protagonist watches a distant funeral procession by the sea. One has to wonder if it is Kore-eda's reflection of the woman's psyche - it is as if the funeral procession is a dream - and she is watching herself grieve from a distance? However, the organic nature of the scene seems to point to the fact that death, though often not explainable, is also a part of nature that humans must learn to accept. This film portrays the woman with exquisite sensitivity. I highly recommend this film.