Analysis: After Life

Frederick Jameson has written that one symptom of the post-modern is the nostalgia film; people have lost the ability to connect with the past and present and look to film to make those connections for them. A stream of the recently deceased pass through a way station and must look back on their lives and choose one memory to take with them into eternity. When watching Kore-Eda’s film After life, a post-modern reading is not far away. However, reading the film simply in terms of post-modernism does it a disservice. Kore-Eda has layered After life in meta-filmic moments that on one level suggest a post-modern meaning but on another show that film may still have the power to be meaningful.

The film introduces a variety of characters who reminisce over their lives, searching for their one perfect memory. Once the memory is found it is recreated on film. The person then watches the film of their memory and immediately moves on. In this moment, film is made absolutely necessary for people to reach peace and rest. On one level, this necessity can be read as people’s failure to connect with their pasts on their own, they need mediation. It is not truly their memories they are reliving but a simulacrum of life. One of these people, Watanabe, is an old man who cannot choose. He is looking for an evidence of life but is unable to remember anything. He on his own is unable to connect with his past and only through the use of videotapes can he remember it. These meta-filmic moments, the recreation of memories on film and the videos of a person’s life, reveal films use as a connective tool and leave room for a cynical reading of After life: we are trapped in a post-modern moment and the only escape is through false memories and into an eternity of simulacra, there is no hope.

Of course, Kore-Eda refuses to make his film so simple. In fact, he does offer hope. For example, with Watanabe, while it’s true he needs the videos to remember the past, these representations of memories do not actually help him choose. It is through two conversations, one with Iseya who refuses to choose and one with his counselor who was actually his wife’s fiancé before being killed in WWII, that Watanabe is finally able to choose. He is offered the easy solution of a false connection by randomly choosing a memory off of the tapes, but it is through real connections with other people that his choice is actually made. Another moment of Kore-Eda’s denial of post-modernism is through the girl Yoshino. Originally, she wants to choose a memory of Disneyland (the ultimate example of simulacra) but after a conversation with Shiori, one of the counselors, Yoshino changes her choice to a vague memory of her mother’s lap from when she was a little girl. She turns her back on simulacra and chooses something real.

It can still be said that even with the choice of real memory, by recreating it on film a new simulacra is still being made. And the question of why these films are necessary is never really satisfactorily answered within the narrative but by reading them as a comment by Kore-Eda on the nature of filmmaking itself, it is still possible to move past the post-modern reading. The memory films are not giving a false sense of reality, they are actually making moments of perfection from people’s lives livable again, if only briefly. One noticeable aspect of these memory films is their low budgets (a parallel with the reality of independent filmmaking). These low budgets lead to a necessity of creativity and simplicity. As a result, these films do not focus on creating a false sense of reality through fancy tricks but instead focus on creating a glimpse of the truth of reality through a lack of style. It seems that Kore-Eda is disavowing post-modernism and it’s claim that the possibility of negation no longer exists. Instead, there is a claim that film still has the ability to function as art and that the power of negation is still present.

Kore-Eda wants us to feel that what we are watching is real; he wants us to connect with the film in a meaningful way. He uses the meta-filmic moments to allow us to recognize that we are watching a film and to from there make real connections to it. We are not allowed to mindlessly absorb what we are being presented with, the film engages us and is able to succeed in offering an alternative to the belief in post-modernism. As the counselors watch the moon, one comments that it’s shape never changes only the light reflecting off it makes it appear to. After life could be saying the same thing about the meaningfulness of film and the reality of art and life that lies beneath it, it’s not the shape and possibilities that are changing but only our perceptions.

Analysis: Cruel Story of Youth

Oshima argues that it is necessary for a filmmaker to be actively involved in his work; he needs to put himself into his work and make it a part of his external reality. This can only be accomplished through an absence of style, through self-negation. The function of art is to stand outside of culture and offer a criticism and this can only be accomplished through negation. If a filmmaker allows himself to develop a signature style then that style becomes a commodity, it is only by resisting that temptation can a filmmaker create truly radical films. Oshima indicates that he is attempting to achieve this self-negation and by examining the sound design of his film Cruel Story of Youth it is possible to see the tension that he has managed to create between his film and the audience, between art and reality.

Sound is an incredibly important part of film; no matter how good the visual component of a film may be, bad sound will make it seem amateurish. In Oshima’s Cruel Story of Youth it is apparent that the sound was not recorded synchronously and was rather dubbed in. Throughout the film there is very little ambient sound and while the sound effects match the visuals they seem removed, the lack of ambient sound creates a hollowness behind any sound effect. For example, in the scene when Mako is first seduced, Kiyoshi throws her into the water. The only sound in that scene is the dialogue between the two actors and the splashing of water. There are no footsteps, no passing cars or boats, no water other than the splashing, no wind. It is apparent that the sound was not recorded on site but perhaps later, in a studio. The result is that we are made very aware that what we are watching is a film. A tension is created between the desire to lose oneself in the film world and the inability to do so because Oshima is subtly reminding us that what we are watching is not, in fact, reality.

The music of the film is also significant. The diegetic music that plays is almost completely jazz. It characterizes their rebellion against expectations. They are the dissatisfied youth and jazz is their anthem. This choice of jazz is significant because it frequently characterizes attempts at rebellion but fails in the act of negation. Jazz can easily be commodified and when people listen to it or play it they are lulled into a false sense of individuality. They think they are rebelling already so they do nothing to actually rebel. What is it that Oshima is attempting to say about the current youth culture then? If the New Wave film movement in Japan, which this film is supposed to be a part of, is not about what the film stands for but rather what it stands against, as was suggested in class, then what this film is about is the new standing against the old. The presence of Jazz is possibly not there to signify rebellion; it is there to signify the separation of the youth generation from the generation that came before. The one time in the film when a non-jazz piece of music is played diegetically, Kiyoshi says “Bah, Beethoven,” but he then listens to it. He doesn’t actively rebel by changing the radio station, taking the focus away from rebellion, but his comment does bring the focus to difference.

Analysis: Close To Eden

Close to Eden, or Urga, is a film about change. Gombo lives on the border of two lands, China and Russian, and he lives on the border between two times. Close to Eden explores the changing times and one of the most important characters in this exploration is the land itself.

The land becomes a character itself by the way Mikhalkov represents it with his camera. The way his camera wonders away from the action of the film and becomes lost in the hills and grass seems to imply that the land is more important than whatever may be happening to the people that live there. As Ghosh and Sarkar say in their article “The Cinema of Displacement: Towards a Politically Motivated Poetics,” “land is a cultural repository of memories and symbolic of a way of life. The point is made by the camera’s repeated privileging of landscape over action. Often, the camera will focus for several seconds on the plains, and all action is suspended.”

Gombo is a part of this land. He is of Mongolian descent and belongs himself more to the past than the present. He speaks fondly of Genghis Khan and hopes to have another son becomes Khan was a fourth son. His wife, a city girl, tries to persuade him to become a part of modern times. She insists he travel to buy condoms and a television set. When he enters the city, he obviously does not belong to it. He rides through on a horse and looks horribly out of place.

He finally makes the return trip with the television in tow, but he feels guilty about succumbing to the lures of the modern times. Ghosh and Sarkar point out a dream sequence he has on his return trip that illustrates his guilt. “The narrative repeatedly raises questions of home and its loss: in a Chinese nightclub, Sergei sings of the ‘Hills of Manchuria’; Gombo’s wife puts on her ancient Mongolian head-dress and gazes onto a glorious historical past and a disappeared ‘home’; Gombo himself has visions of Genghis Khan’s revenge on him because he is on the brink of forsaking his heritage.”

As they have pointed out, it is not only Gombo that is uncomfortable with the changing times, all of the characters of the film are anxious. All want to remain in the past where their roles and places are familiar. The end represents this past and familiarity. While everything around them has changed, the land has not. The green hills and the swaying grasses are timeless. However, the times are changing and the present enters Gombo’s home even in the midst of the timeless land around it.

Sergei, Gombo’s wife, and their neighbor all bring the modern to Gombo. Sergei is a Russian truck driver and brings another cultural to the land with his truck that cuts across it, leaving its tracks in the grass. Gombo’s wife brings the present in with her insistence that he buy a TV and birth control. Gombo’s neighbor brings souvenirs to Gombo, including an American movie poster. Gombo cannot resist the influx of the modern into his life; it comes from too many angles.

Gombo is a part of his land and of the past. Ghosh and Sarkar describe it as “’Home’ for Gombo is literally a humble shack surrounded by an undulating landscape where he grazes his horses. The open plains, seemingly unmarked by signs of ownership, are sometimes staked out as personal: Gombo plants his urga as a sign of privacy when he makes love to his wife on the grass.” Gombo is a part of the land. The only ownership that is ever claimed is that that they note, when he is making love to wife, an act that is as timeless and natural as the land itself.

The natural act of lovemaking is under attack in the film. Gombo’s wife does not want another child so she urges him to buy condoms. China has put limitations on how many children you may have, and Gombo has already exceeded that number. While he insists he is not a part of China so the law does not apply to him, he cannot ignore the urgings of his wife. His wife finally wins out and he goes to buy the condoms. However, in the end he does not succumb, he does not buy them and tells his wife that they were sold out.

He has however bought the television. He cannot resist all of the changes that are occurring and he cannot completely block out the modern world. As lovemaking has come under attack, by the end of the film so has the land. The final shots of the land that represented the richness of Gombo’s past are of a land that is no longer green and isolated from the world. The hills are covered by the tracks of trucks and a giant smokestack fills overwhelms the horizon. Gombo’s son works at a near by gas station and it seems that despite all of Gombo’s resistance to it, the present has overwhelmed the past.

Analysis: May

****WARNING: POSSIBLE SPOILERS****

In 2002 Lucky McKee’s independent horror feature May was released. May is a story about a lonely young woman trying to find her place within society. She longs to connect with people around her but because of who she is, how she was raised, and the way society is she is forced to live a life of rejection. McKee has created a complex film that deals with a variety of issues facing society, particularly facing women, including image, identity, sexuality, and violence.

Is May really evil? She is clearly deficient in social skills and is therefore unable to effectively interact with others. May is a character that is easy to relate to. She’s socially awkward, lonely, and curious. She is also adventurous, not afraid of taking risks, and loving. While she seems so shy, something about her is very attractive. Polly sees it immediately and, despite their unconventional first meeting, Adam comes to see it as well. May is sweet and inspires feelings of empathy and love. When the people in her life fail her, she lashes out violently in retaliation. While we are not expected to condone her actions, it’s hard to deny that we aren’t at least a little envious of her ability to strike back at the people who have done her wrong. These actions are a reflection and exaggeration of what we all secretly wish we could do. May is not evil because while in the film she becomes a violent killer, she represents more than violence. She represents how women are expected to behave in society and what a destructive effect this has when these expectations force women to attempt to fit into a role that runs counter to where we feel we belong. May is very honest about who she is and it’s this honesty and failure to accept her prescribed place that causes her to be rejected.

Sexuality plays an interesting role in the film. A large part of the film is about May’s sexual awakening and exploration. It shows her awkwardness, her excitement, and ultimately her flaw. Despite her inexperience she's curious and willing to explore. She has almost no inhibitions. But then her sexual freedom is tied into her weirdness and freakiness. It is also tied in with violence. Sex and violence for May are so closely related that the line blurs and she can't distinguish between the two. Polly is fascinated by the idea but only in a very superficial way, her flirtation with violence has more to do with her flirtation with May than it has to do with an authentic interest. Adam's interest in the two is also different from May's. For her they are one and then same, which we see very early in the scene with the fake knife. With Adam there is a very clear line drawn between the two. He likes violence in his movies but when it comes to reality he can't handle it. He plays with the idea of being weird but is turned off by true weirdness. As he is leaving her, they have a brief exchange. “This is weird” he says, “But you like weird” she says, sounding confused. “Not that weird.” And he leaves.

In addition to May’s sexuality, there is also Polly’s. The relationship between the two women develops not because May is a lesbian, but because she is looking for companionship and she sees no wrong in looking for this with a woman. Polly is also very liberated with her sexuality, and she's a lesbian, but in the end she is also punished for her freedom and inhibitions. It’s not an unfamiliar scenario; frequently female characters “punished” when they choose to follow a course of actions contrary to ones they are expected to follow. Hollows gives a summary of feminist film criticism and through a discussion of such theorists as Molly Haskell, Laura Mulvey, and Mary Anne Doane she follows how the role of women in film has developed. Women in film are images, they have been objects seen through the “male gaze” and forced into submission.

McKee is very aware of these conventions. When dealing with the male gaze for example, McKee places Polly’s girlfriend Ambrosia in it completely. Where Laura Mulvey states that women in films frequently become nothing more than a pair of legs, McKee makes this message literal. When we first see Ambrosia, all we see are her legs. Every subsequent time she appears the first thing we see is her lower half. McKee is making the male gaze extreme and making the viewer aware of it. The interesting twist is that these shots are all from May’s point of view. By creating the male gaze through her eyes he is giving May power. She is the one controlling the situation, the one we relate to, and the one who can fight back. We see this again later when she wields either her scissors or scalpel. In horror movies such weapons are phallic symbols and are usually used against women. In May McKee gives these weapons, and therefore their power, to May. McKee uses the male gaze not to exploit May and objectify her, but to develop her. She herself is placed within the gaze several times, all when she is either with Adam or getting ready to see him. When she is approaching a relationship to him it appears that she is giving up her power but this is not the case. While May is attempting to fit in socially, hence her position within the gaze, she never compromises herself, which is why she never remains in the gaze for very long.

McKee’s use of the male gaze is also appropriate for the subject matter. The film reflects society’s obsession with image and perfection, which in the end is what drives May's actions. She falls in love with the “perfect parts” but can find no “perfect wholes”. In the beginning, she thinks the parts will lead to these perfect wholes. She quickly realizes though that this is not the case so she decides to create her own whole. It's her imperfection that has kept her so lonely and isolated. It's other people's imperfections that hurt her. The physical flaws that she sees come to represent the internal flaws that she experiences. So in her mind if every external part is perfect then the internal ones will be as well. Susan Douglas notes that this obsession with perfection is one that the media has been encouraging for decades through advertising. For her, it has created impossible standards that women try to live up to but can’t. As a result their lives are split, they work constantly to obtain the impossible image and are always miserable with the body they have.

While McKee doesn’t attack the issue of advertising directly, through the opening involving May’s parents he does show where her obsession comes from. May’s mother plays the role of advertiser, pounding in the message that May must be perfect on a daily basis. When May still has not made friends her mother gives her Suzy, the first doll her mother ever made. Suzy must remain in her glass case, May can look but she can’t touch. For May, Suzy comes to be her only friend but she is also a harsh reminder of who May is and how alone and trapped May feels. In a way Suzy represents May’s sanity, when Suzy is destroyed May soon suffers a complete breakdown. However, the moment Suzy breaks is also moment of May’s liberation. She is able to let go of her inhibitions and fight back. In the narrative May is insane but on a deeper level it isn’t insanity, it is strength and power. She is killing people but she is also liberating herself.

Suzy and the other dolls in the film play an important role. May speaks to them and she also uses them. She is like a child, playing with dolls, reenacting situations between herself and Adam so she can learn about sex. She has a male doll with bright red hands that represents Adam with his perfect hands. She teaches herself how to kiss with this doll and another. Whenever May is with her dolls, she is reminiscent of the two little girls playing with Barbie in Barbie Nation. Her obsession with perfection and belief that only perfect people have friends is reminiscent of the little girl stating that to make friends you need to be pretty. Barbies themselves represent perfection and the impossibility of it, issues that this film is centered around.

In her quest to create the perfect friend, May sews together all of the perfect body parts she has collected to create a life sized doll. When the doll is finished, May soon realizes that her doll is not yet perfect. It can’t see. In one of the most grotesque moments of the film, May uses her scissors to cut out her own good eye which she then places on her doll’s head. May then lies down next to the doll and as the shot composition brings together their two faces to make them almost appear as one it is an obvious reference to Ingmar Bergman’s film Persona, which explores the nature of identity. May’s identity is intertwined with that of her doll’s. It represents her insanity, her quest for perfection, it represents her strengths: creativity, resourcefulness, and strength, as well as her weaknesses: narcissism, violence, and obsession. When the eye rolls of off the dolls face it might show the ineffectiveness of her actions, when she is caught at the very least she will be sent to jail, but when the doll raises it’s arm to embrace her, we see that she has been successful in her macabre quest. She has created a perfect thing that will love and accept her for who she is.

In the end May is a sad story about a girl just trying to fit in. Because she fails to conform she is forced to live an incomplete life. She again refuses to accept this and is driven to go a homicidal killing spree. Society has treated her violently and she strikes back with violence. McKee uses this violent story to attack the stereotypes and expectations that women are forced to live with. May is strong enough to fight back and, in her own way, at the end she is a hero.