Colorful (カラフル, 2010)

Suicide has been a growing concern in Japan over the past couple of decades due to a combination factors such as depression, job stress, and other societal pressures. With his latest film Colorful (カラフル, 2010), veteran animator Keiichi Hara (原 恵一, 1959), takes on the complex psychological factors behind suicide in a meaningful way.

An adaptation of a novel by Eto Mori, Colorful (Order DVD) takes us into the spiritual world of the deceased. In the west, we are familiar with the concepts of the afterlife and visitations from spirits or angels being used as a narrative device in stories such as Charles Dickens’s classic tale A Christmas Carol (1843) or Frank Capra’s perennial Christmas favourite It’s a Wonderful Life (1946). The angels or spirit guides in western fiction tend to present a Christian conception of the afterlife and offer the troubled protagonists advice on improving their circumstances so that they can become good Christians with the promise of heaven awaiting them in the next world.

Examples of Hara's photo-realism animation technique

Colorful presents the dilemma of suicide within the Buddhist conception of the afterlife in which the soul is reincarnated. The film opens with the unnamed main protagonist in a kind of in-between realm. As he has no memory of who he was on earth, he refers to himself only as “boku” (masculine form of referring to oneself). His spirit guide is a young boy with grey hair and eyes called Pura-pura who tells him that he is being given the opportunity to return to the realm of the living. A teenage boy named Makoto Kobayashi has committed suicide and his soul is just about to leave his body. The spirit of “boku” will re-enter Makoto’s body and have a limited period of time in which to discover what mistake he has made in his past life, so that “boku” may move on and enter the next life.

"Makoto" sits with his art

“Boku” struggles with understanding why Makoto Kobayashi would kill himself when he seems to have a family that loves him and a comfortable middle class home. It doesn’t take long before suggestions of intense loneliness, parental infidelity, school bullying, and the discovery of Makoto’s high school crush Hiroka’s shocking secret double life give us clues as to the turmoil that had become unbearable to young Makoto. The other clue to Makoto’s state of mind can be found in his paintings. In particular, an unfinished painting in the art club suggests that he felt submerged, and struggled towards the light.

Pura-pura, the spirit guide

Pura-pura is an unusual spirit guide by western standards because he is far from angelic. Also a boy himself, Pura-pura resorts to manipulative tactics such as provoking with words or threat of physical bulliyng in order to push “boku” in the right direction. In the end, the main protagonist must not only look within himself to find a resolution to his situation, but also learn empathy for others. The main message of the film is that people are not monochromatic, they are colourful. We may find some of these colours beautiful and others ugly, but we need to learn to accept both in order to lead happy, productive lives.

As with Hara’s other independent film Summer Days with Coo (2007), Colorful has an animation style that is unique to Hara. A lot of attention is paid to accuracy in the details of spaces such as streets locations and the interiors of homes and the school. As with Coo, I had the impression that some exterior scenes were made using a composite of photographs and animation. Hara does indeed use a full, colourful palette in the film – which is particularly striking in the scene when “boku” as Makoto goes fishing with his father and paints the autumn leaves.

It’s a beautiful film that is a must-see for teenagers in particular because it opens the door to discussions about how to overcome depression and feelings of loneliness and despair.

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Colorful won the Animation Film Award at the 65th Mainichi Film Awards and was nominated for Animation of the Year at the Japanese Academy Awards.

Catherine Munroe Hotes 2011

Nippon Connection 2011

ANPO: Art X War (2010)

Shigeo Ishii's 'Decoy'

It is difficult to measure the psychological impact war and occupation have on nations. Most documentaries content themselves with trotting out the facts and figures and interviewing loquacious historians and political figures. In ANPO: Art X War (2010), Linda Hoaglund uses art to tell the riveting story of the emotional impact the American occupation has had on the people of Japan.

For people like me, who were born and grew up in post war North America, the Pacific War seems like ancient history. In the intervening years, the United States has become involved in many other conflicts around the globe and World War II only surfaces as a point of conversation on the anniversaries of events like bombings of Pearl Harbor, Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Hiroshi Nakamura with his work 'Base'

For the people of Japan, the continuing presence of American troops stationed across the country is a constant reminder of old political wounds that have never been resolved. Officially, the American Occupation of Japan ended in 1952. However, thousands of American soldiers remain stationed in Japan under the terms of the Treaty of Mutual Cooperation and Security between the United States and Japan – known colloquially in Japan as anpo joyaku (安保条約) or just plain ANPO.

In high school history classes we are taught that Japanese war criminals were tried and executed by military tribunals after the war. However, the truth of the matter is not so straight forward. Many of the men responsible for wartime atrocities managed to escape punishment and even continued to work in politics. One of these men was Nobusuke Kishi, who went on to serve as prime minister and was one of the key architects behind the 1960 extension of the ANPO treaty. Kishi became a puppet of the CIA, who used him in order to achieve their Cold War aims of using Japan as a buffer against communism. The people of Japan had not forgotten the role that Kishi and his militarist peers played in leading their country into war and during the 1950s and 1960s grassroots protest movements began swelling up against the American presence in Japan.

Hoaglund lays out a basic historical framework through interviews with historians such as Masayasu Hosoka (The Truth about the 1960 ANPO Struggle), New York Times journalist Tim Weiner (Legacy of Ashes, a history of CIA covert acticivities), and journalist Kazutochi Hando (The History of Showa), but the real meat of the film is the art itself and the testimony of the artists. This perspective is carefully crafted by Hoaglund, whose childhood in Japan as the daughter of American missionaries and her work as a much sought after translator and film subtitler (Spirited Away, Waterboys, After Life, et al.) gives her unique insights into the relationship between the two cultures. 

Miyako Ishiuchi and her work 'Hiroshima'

Of the dozens of artists, photographers, and filmmakers whose work was shown during the film, some that really stood out for me were the paintings and testimony of Hiroshi Nakamura, Magnum photographer Hiroshi Hamaya’s documentation of the ANPO demonstrations in the spring of 1960, and Yukio Tomizawa’s explosive documentary Rage at ANPO (1960). Some artists used satire as their method of expression, such as influential pop artist Tadanori Yokoo’s illustration of Prime Minister Eisaku Sato which was rejected by Time Magazine in 1970 as too political. Others, such as photographer Miyako Ishiuchi, try to tell the stories of ordinary people destroyed by political events beyond their control, as in her powerful photo series 'Hiroshima' in which she photographed the carefully preserved clothing worn by victims of atom bomb. The art in combination with the testimony of the artists lays bare the long term impact that ANPO has had on the artists themselves and how it has shaped their artistic sensibilities. 

The image that Time magazine commissioned and rejected from Yokoo

ANPO: Art X War captures not only a feeling of outrage at the hypocrisy of the Americans in ignoring the human rights of the people whose land they are occupying, but a greater sense of pain and frustration that the people feel at being betrayed by Japanese politicians who are meant to be representing their interests as citizens. The wide variety of paintings, prints, photographs, and film clips (both documentary and feature films) express these complex circumstances in a way that mere words never could.

I found the experience of watching the film overwhelming at times. It was not only the volume of images – 175 works in all – but the emotional impact of many of the works. Kyoko Ureshino’s photograph “A Little Girl Killed by a U.S. Military Truck” (1965) depicting a toddler moments after being crushed to death with the American soldiers staring at her lifeless body is such a powerful image and is now seared in my memory (see it in the slideshow of images from the film on the Art in America website). The interview with Okinawan photographer Mao Ishikawa is also very impactful. Her frustration at the presence of the American bases on Okinawa is matched by her sadness for the young U.S. soldiers whom she sees as lambs to slaughter. Hoaglund’s film not only looks to the past but also sheds light on the current generation of artists such as Makoto Aida, Sachiko Kazama and Chikako Yamashiro who are also concerned about the ways in which the ANPO Treaty and the continuing American presence in Japan has affected them. 

Talking heads on American television often speak incredulously of anti-American sentiment as if the people who want them off of their lands are somehow lacking in gratitude or just jealous of American might. ANPO: Art X War is the antidote to such simple-minded claptrap, demonstrating as it does the complex ramifications of occupation. I feel sure that if similar films were to be made expressing the suffering of the peoples of Korea, Afghanistan, Iraq, and others through their art, it would give the world a much greater insight into the humanity of the people living those countries. Recognizing that the hopes and dreams of other citizens of this world are not so different from our own is the best way of preventing such conflicts from happening in the future.

Catherine Munroe Hotes 2011

Update 17 May 2011: I've been told that this film is currently available on DVD for educators to purchase.  Click here to learn more.

Nippon Connection 2011

Atsushi Wada Works 2002 – 2010

CALF’s latest instalment in its Japanese Independent Animators series, Atsushi Wada Works 2002-2010, reveals a great deal about the light and shade that make up this young, award-winning animator. From his earliest works, Atsushi Wada (和田淳, b. 1980) was already playing with the concept of “ma” (間) – the space between two structural parts. In the case of his animation, Wada expresses “ma” in terms of the way in which he structures movement and the absence of movement.

Wada taught himself animation for his earliest film Be Vague (夢現, 2002) and as he writes in the liner notes, the film has very little movement in it because of his desire “not to create moving images or to tell a story, but rather to create “ma”, the tension produced in the silence between movements.” Wada uses a bit too much narration – in this case verbose title cards – instead of just allowing the images to speak for themselves, but this is quite common in the work of beginner filmmakers.

With each of Wada’s early works, one can see a steady progression of his skills as an animator. Cette mayonnaise est trop liquid (This Mayonnaise is Too Runny/このマヨネーズはゆるすぎる, 2002)  reveals Wada's quirky sense of humour as the Kewpie figure on the Kewpie Mayonnaise tube escapes from the bottle along with the runny mayonnaise. As with Be Vague, there is a roughness to the illustration style and animation movement, however one can see Wada developing his eye for the absurd in the commonplace.

Dancer of the vermicular

A Whistle (笛, 2003) and Dancer of the Vermicular (蠕虫舞手, 2004) are adaptations of poems by prominent Shōwa literary figures Sakutarō Hagiwara (萩原 朔太郎, 1886- 1942) and Kenji Miyazawa (宮沢 賢治, 1896-1933). This was an illuminating discovery for like modernist verse, Wada’s films are minimalist in structure but rich in metaphor. Just as a good poem reveals new depths of meaning with each reading, Wada’s films require multiple screenings in order for all the subtle layers of meaning to be fully appreciated. A Whistle and Dancer of the Vermicular are also significant early works for the way in which Wada plays with surrealist elements such as the literal cloud of bad humour metamorphosing into little figures running around in A Whistle, and the male figure flying in the air like a parasitic worm in Dancer of the Vermicular.

My first experience with Atsushi Wada’s animation was his 2006 film Manipulated Man (声が出てきた人) which was his contribution to the Tokyo Loop omnibus. This is the only work of Wada’s not featured on this collected works (it appears on the Tokyo Loop DVD), but its theme of the pressures of society to conform to certain norms also underlies the films Yellow (キイロノヒト, 2003), Gentle Whistle, Bird, and Stone (やさしい笛、鳥、石, 2005), and Day of Nose (鼻の日, 2006). These films also demonstrate Wada’s technique of using repetition and variation, much in the way that a musical composer might, as a form of expression. Yellow suggests that adult women still resort to childish tendencies when it comes to the pressures of fashion and Gentle Whistle, Bird, and Stone tackles the issue of bullying. Like Manipulated Man, Day of Nose examines the salaryman mentality with its pressures to conform, and the subtle measures of resistance taken by individuals.

Judging from the advancement in Wada’s animation techniques between 2004 and 2005, it is clear that Image Forum’s animation school had a profound effect on shaping his craft. The one 8mm film that Wada did during his time there Concerning the Rotation of a Child (子供の廻転の事, 2004) has a dark look due to the medium, but the carefully crafted movements of the girl as she does repeated front walkovers foreshadow the smooth rotation movements that Wada will use in future films.

His film Clerk in Charge (係, 2004) features a clerk who checks the quality of elephants before having them carried off by small birds to major cities around the world. The sound effects give the impression that the elephants are being treated as if they are on a kind of industrial assembly line. In the liner notes, Wada suggests that he decided upon the elephant because he wanted to emphasize his tatami fill technique. Indeed, this is the first of Wada’s films where I feel that he confidently established the aesthetic that he is now recognizable for: the characters are drawn with very fine lines drawn with a 0.3mm mechanical pencil. Areas that are dark – such as hair, or the body of the elephants – are then shaded in using a 0.5mm mechanical pencil. This shading is done in a fashion that resembles the fine bundled straws of a tatami mat. Wada has also used this technique in some of his earlier films (A Whistle, Yellow, and Dancer of Vermicular), but this was the first time that the dark shaded areas are contrasted so starkly against a plain, minimalistic background.

The ambiguous mammal Wada designed for the CALF logo

The prominence of the form of the elephant in Clerk in Charge also draws attention to Wada’s recurring use of animals. Sometimes, these animals are vaguely drawn – like the sheep and goats being difficult to distinguish from one another (Wada also designed the ambiguous mammal used as CALF logo). Sometimes the animals have human features like the sheep-human hybrid in Well, that’s Glasses (そういう眼鏡, 2007) or the frogs in Mechanism of Spring (春のしくみ, 2010). Other popular motifs are birds, pigs, deer, turtles (often helpless flailing on their backs), frogs, and snails.

Wada’s most recent work has become more ambitious in terms of the complexity of the image and character movement and more playful in terms of subject matter. At screenings of some of his earlier films, I often sensed unease and incomprehension among fellow members of the audience. At the CALF Animation Special event at Nippon Connection two weeks ago, I found that the audience really connected with his two most recent works In a Pig’s Eye (わからないブタ, 2010) and Mechanism of Spring. In a Pig’s Eye, which has won several awards including Best Film at Fantoche last fall and an Excellence Prize at the Japan Media Arts Festival, strikes just the right balance between disturbing images of the furtive behaviour inside of the home and delightfully absurd interactions between the chubby boys and the pigs (one comically over-sized and the other just a piglet) in the yard.

Mechanism of Spring

The Mechanism of Spring is Wada’s most light-hearted film to date, capturing the delight that young children and animals take in the season. The young chubby boys examine the wildlife, take off their shirts and run about gaily, and observe a plant sprouting out of the earth, among other delights. The frogs behaving like humans recall the famous picture scrolls Chōjū-giga (鳥獣戯画, c.12th-13th centuries) which depict frolicking animals.  In fact, I have often had the impression that the colours and framing choices of Wada's films recall the aesthetics of Japanese scroll paintings.

Unlike the dynamically coloured films of his CALF colleague Mirai Mizue, Atsushi Wada has always been much more reserved in his use of colour. In his early films, he used colour quite sparingly: the necessary red of the mayonnaise tube cap in Cette mayonnaise est trop liquid or the yellow dress and red jewellery in Yellow. His more recent films use much more colour, but in very subtle hues. In the "Making of Atsushi Wada" bonus extra, Wada explains that he “paints” his films using Photoshop after scanning his drawings into the computer. The distinctive look of his colour scheme comes from his careful selection of the natural hues that the paper he draws on already has. 

Atsushi Wada Works 2002 – 2010 can be ordered directly from CALF. The DVD is fully bilingual Japanese-English. There is an accompanying booklet with descriptions of the films by the artist himself. European customers can now also purchase CALF DVDs from the British Animation Awards online shop.

To learn more about Atsushi Wada, read my interview with him last fall. To learn more about CALF, read my reviews of Mirai Mizue Works 2003-2010 and Tochka Works 2006-2010, or the piece I wrote for Midnight Eye.

Catherine Munroe Hotes 2011