Kikujiro
Japan 1998
Reviewed by Tommy Udo
Synopsis
Our synopses give away the plot in full, including surprise twists.
Tokyo, the present. Masao, an only child, lives with his grandmother. His only friend leaves for his summer holiday. Finding a photograph of his mother with an address, Masao sets out to find her. Miki, a friend of his grandmother's, makes her husband, yakuza Kikujiro, accompany the child on his quest. Their first stop is the bike races where Kikujiro loses all his money, but Masao picks three winners. Kikujiro blows the winnings on an absurd cycling outfit for the boy and the rest in a hostess bar. The next day Masao is unable to repeat his trick, leaving them broke. Setting out on foot, their journey is a series of mishaps involving a paedophile who tries to molest Masao, a stolen taxi and a bus stop in the middle of nowhere. They also encounter help along the way from a hotel manager, a punk couple and a wandering poet.
Arriving at his mother's home, Masao sees her with her husband and daughter. Kikujiro tries to comfort the boy, first taking him to a fun fair where the gangster gets beaten up, and then to a bizarre beach camp with the poet and two bikers whom he makes play a series of games to amuse Masao. Kikujiro goes off on a quest of his own to see his mother who is in a home nearby. They return to Tokyo and part.
Review
Takeshi Kitano suggested in interviews that Kikujiro would be a break from the postmodern gangster films that established his reputation outside Japan. Though this is true in terms of action, his eighth feature does focus on yet another washed-up yakuza and reprises many favourite scenes and motifs. In fact, as the director's most autobiographical movie to date, Kikujiro could be seen as a key to all of his work. Kitano's own father, a largely absent drunk also named Kikujiro, was once forced to spend a summer with his son, much like the character Kikujiro with the parentless boy Masao here. However, it would be unwise to read too much autobiography into a work by such a notoriously unreliable and media-savvy narrator, especially one that feels lighter and less personal in tone than Hana-Bi.
Like Sonatine and Hana-Bi before it, Kikujiro taps into a deep-seated Japanese strain of sentimentality. The two central characters maintain a respectful distance throughout their tribulations, whereas the film's Hollywood antecedents - Charles Chaplin's The Kid (1921), Peter Bogdanovich's Paper Moon (1973) and even Barry Levinson's Rain Man - can't resist touchy-feely cathartic hugs. It is this constant, quiet, formal respect and politeness between gangster and child that gives the final scene - a shot of the boy's angel-winged backpack as he runs over a bridge, also the first shot of the film - its emotional resonance.
Kikujiro marks Kitano's sixth collaboration with director of photography Katsumi Yanagijima, who shoots the film like a series of still images. Much of Kitano's comedy derives from this technique, explicating a scene through a series of tableaux. For instance, during Kikujiro and Masao's stay at a hotel, one shot shows Kikujiro floating face down in the water, unmoving. A cut shows Masao and the staff looking on; the next paramedics reviving Kikujiro, all producing a deadpan effect. Kitano has often used the same method to deal with violence, whether for comic or dramatic ends. Similar treatment is given here to the sequence depicting a paedophile luring Masao to a public toilet, where he persuades the boy to undress. Kikujiro arrives in time to save the kid and in a series of cutaways beats the molester up. And when Kikujiro is attacked by heavies at a fairground, we don't see the kicks and punches, only their effect on his bloodied face.
Takeshi specialises in playing stoic, often monosyllabic hard men, relying on his exquisite range of looks, head movements, nose rubbings and twitches. Nishi in Hana-Bi barely uttered a word in the first half of the film, allowing the other characters to drive the action. Kikujiro, by way of contrast, is a loud-mouthed thug who bullies, threatens and dominates those around him (with the exception of his wife) and swells out in the second act so as to overpower everyone else. As with Sonatine, in which gangsters played at sumo wrestling, Kikujiro's most memorable images are of games on a beach, of hard men engaged in childish play. Two bikers are made to dress up as fish or aliens for Masao's entertainment, while Kikujiro barks instructions at them, as if he - or Kitano - was trying to recreate some lost world of childish innocence for both of them.
It remains to be seen if Kitano's forthcoming Hollywood directorial debut Brother will bring him popular success on a par with the critical acclaim heaped on his two best films to date, Sonatine and Hana-Bi. In the meantime, Kikujiro leaves you with the sense that he is consolidating previous work, even treading water. That said, it's a beautiful and engaging film with vivid scenes which linger in the memory long after they've faded from the screen.
Credits
- Director
- Takeshi Kitano
- Producers
- Masayuki Mori
- Takio Yoshida
- Screenplay
- Takeshi Kitano
- Director of Photography
- Katsumi Yanagijima
- Editors
- Takeshi Kitano
- Yoshinori Ota
- Production Designer
- Norihiro Isoda
- Music
- Joe Hisaishi
- ©Bandai Visual/
Tokyo FM/Nippon Herald/Office Kitano- Production Companies
- Presented by Bandai Visual, Tokyo FM, Nippon Herald and Office Kitano
- Line Producer
- Shinji Komiya
- Associate Producers
- Naoyuki Sakagami
- Kazuhiro Furukawa
- Kazumi Kawashiro
- Production Co-ordinators
- Toshio Tanaka
- Michitada Kai
- Unit Production Manager
- Akira Yamamoto
- Assistant Directors
- Hiroshi Shimizu
- Shinsuke Ohno
- Takeshi Matsukawa
- Toru Yoshida
- Script Supervisor
- Hideko Nakata
- Script Co-ordinator
- Noriyasu Sato
- Casting
- Takefumi Yoshikawa
- 2nd Unit Director of Photography
- Takahiro Tsunoi
- Lighting Designer
- Hisashi Takaya
- Digital Compositing
- Hideki Chiba
- Art Director
- Takayuki Nitta
- Set Decorator
- Tatsuo Ozeki
- Angel Bell Design
- Katsuyuki Shinohara
- Costume Co-ordinator
- Fumio Iwasaki
- Hair/Make-up Artist
- Mitsuyo Miyauchi
- Tattoo Artist
- Ryoji Kasumi
- Title Designer
- Yokozo Akamatsu
- Opticals
- Keiji Igarashi
- Music Producers
- Makoto Morimoto
- Shunji Tsuchikawa
- Akira Watanebe
- Music Engineer
- Tadanobu Hamada
- Sound Design
- Senji Horiuchi
- Optical Re-recording
- Akira Toshizawa
- Re-recordist
- Akira Nakano
- Sound Effects Designer
- Yukio Hokari
- Cast
- 'Beat' Takeshi
- Kikujiro
- Yusuke Sekiguchi
- Masao
- Kayoko Kishimoto
- Miki, Kikujiro's wife
- Kazuko Yoshiyuki
- Masao's grandmother
- Great Gidayu
- fat biker
- Rakkyo Ide
- biker's friend
- Akaji Maro
- pervert, surviving soldier
- Yuko Daike
- Masao's mother
- Fumie Hosokawa
- the girl on a date
- Daigaku Sekine
- Yakuza boss
- Yoji Tanaka
- Makoto Inamiya
- Hisahiko Murasawa
- Yakuzas
- Nezumi Imamura
- travelling man
- Beat Kiyoshi
- the man at the bus stop
- Taro Suwa
- Hidehisa Ejiri
- hucksters
- Kanako Kojima
- Kyoko Nagata
- Emi Kobayashi
- Fuyu Oba
- Yuki Tsukamoto
- Yuko Yasui
- hostesss
- Toshiki Kobayashi
- Shota Yoshikawa
- Tomoyasu Tanaka
- Mitsuhiro Yoshimura
- Hidenori Suzuki
- Tatsuya Yamada
- Takaya Ito
- junior high students
- Kuniharu Tokunaga
- Masaru Takahashi
- Keiichiro Sakagi
- Kiryu Machida
- Naoto Seshimo
- Hiro Tategata
- Yuji Hatou
- people of Asakusa
- Fumizo Tachibanaya
- Shuji Otsuki
- Koji Kikuchi
- Shuhei Saga
- Takanari Michimata
- Takeshi Onishi
- Koichiro Hama
- Koichi Ibuki
- Kimihiko Okazaki
- Hitoshi Suwabe
- Hideaki Shimizu
- Hideto Maruyama
- Koshio Jindoji
- Isamu Ishizaka
- Takuya Hashimoto
- Yoshiyuki Ukon
- Hirotsugu Kurosu
- Shoko Togawa
- Kyoko Kitazawa
- people met on the road
- Kenta Arai
- Masao's friend
- Hiroki Nakagawa
- Katsuya Tanizawa
- Nanami Ota
- Mebuki Tsuchida
- Kazuhiro Tsuchida
- Hitomi Arai
- kids
- Certificate
- 12
- Distributor
- Pathé Distribution
- 10,995 feet
- 122 minutes 10 seconds
- Dolby
- In Colour
- Subtitles
- Japanese theatrical title
- Kikujiro No Natsu