Maborosi
Composite Score: 86
Starring: Makiko Esumi, Takashi Naitô, Tadanobu Asano, Gohki Kashiyama, Naomi Watanabe, Midori Kiuchi, Akira Emoto, Mutsuko Sakura, Ren Ôsugi, and Kikuko Hashimoto
Director: Kore-eda Hirokazu
Writer: Yoshihisa Ogita
Genres: Drama, Slice of Life
MPAA Rating: Not Rated
Box Office: $144,025 worldwide
Why should you Watch This Film?
Maborosi is Kore-eda Hirokazu’s debut feature film, based on Teru Miyamoto’s novel Maboroshi no Hikari, about a woman whose husband commits suicide unexpectedly and her life after the event, as she raises their son, remarries, and moves to a coastal town with her new husband and stepdaughter. The film stars Makiko Esumi in the lead role as Yumiko, joined by Takashi Naitô as her second husband Tamio, Tadanobu Asano as her first husband Ikuo, and Gohki Kashiyama as her son Yuichi. The film has been praised for its striking cinematography, withdrawn but impactful acting, and artful exploration of death, grief, and loneliness. It’s a simple but emotional film that offers more questions than answers, but it feels incredibly true to life as it does so.
Why shouldn’t you Watch This Film?
Maborosi, profound and well-shot as it is, follows the path of many slice-of-life films, immersing its audience in the day-to-day life of its protagonist and communicating its themes and message through her interactions with her fellow characters. This is not necessarily every moviegoer’s ideal format for consuming film, and I want to just preface that and prepare you here if you are thinking about watching it. It dwells on each sequence and shot for longer than many audiences might be used to, resulting in a slower pace that might feel like it drags a bit throughout the almost two-hour runtime. It’s a film that invites you to sit and ponder with it the sadness that it puts on display, but that’s not necessarily a film that everyone wants to put on all the time. There’s no denying that it’s a well-crafted film. It just might not be what everyone is looking for when they go to pick out a film on Friday nights.
So wait, why should you Watch This Film?
What Kore-eda has done in the shot composition and cinematography of Maborosi is nothing short of impressive. Though it might slow the pace down some, each shot feels like the most intentionally crafted bit of film ever made, with special attention paid to blocking and the empty spaces. It feels as though the film is inviting the audience to stand in those empty spaces alongside the characters and appreciate their grief or to focus in on those spaces and recognize how big and empty the world can be, especially to those coping with unexplained and unfathomable loss. The moments when Yumiko does open herself up to connection with other people again then feel all the more powerful, given her perspective of aloneness. It’s a film about death and grief, full of empty spaces and massive landscapes, that nevertheless communicates positively about the possibility of life beyond loss and that encourages us to process loss in our own time, recognizing the nonlinearity of grief so beautifully. Makiko Esumi does a good job of capturing this theme in her reserved performance, allowing her silence to speak just as much as her voice as Yumiko processes and grapples with her husband’s seemingly unexplainable death.
Maborosi is a beautifully made film that invites its audience to live with its characters, particularly its protagonist, in their lives and the grief and loneliness that they are processing in order to better appreciate such moments in our own lives, fully earning it a place among the Greatest Films of All Time. Its slower pace and lack of typical plot structure might be frustrating or off-putting for more mainstream audiences, but the images of life and loss that it portrays are so powerful that it remains one that is worth watching. Currently, you can stream this film for free with a valid library card on Kanopy, with an Ovid subscription, or you can rent it on Kino Now if you’d like to check it out.
