by Andrea Grunert

 

Right from the opening credits, a direct link is established between Fumihiko Sori’s Ichi (2008) and Kan Shimozawa’s short story “The Tale of Zatoichi” (“Zatōichi monogatari”, published in 1948), informing the viewer that the film is based on Shimozawa’s work of literature. Moreover, Ichi is a spin-off of a whole series of jidai geki films starring Shintarō Katsu in the role of Zatōichi (1), the itinerant blind masseur and master with the sword. In Sori’s film, Ichi is a woman, a blind wandering musician, and is played by Haruka Ayase. Her name is a direct play on “ichi” in “zatōichi” (2). And like the hero in the film series, Sori’s Ichi excels at swordfighting.
Ichi starts with an image of snowflakes against a night sky. In the next shot, a blind figure is making slow progress across a wintry landscape. Shots of snow-covered landscapes appear repeatedly in the film, and snow is also a reminder of two films featuring a female swordfighter: Lady Snowblood (Shurayuki-hime, Japan, 1973) and Lady Snowblood 2: Love Song of Vengeance (Shurayuki-hime: urami renga, Japan, 1974), both directed by Toshiya Fujita (3). Not unlike Yuki (Meiko Kaji), the heroine in Fujita’s films, Ichi kills efficiently. However, Yuki – whose name means “snow” – is trained to be a cold-blooded killer. She hacks and slashes her way through the narrative, driven solely by the desire for vengeance. Her aim is to fulfil her late mother’s wish and take revenge on the men who had murdered her husband and young child and had raped her, Yuki being the child resulting from this act of rape.
Ichi, after being expelled from a group of blind female itinerant musicians has her own motive for her pilgrimage round Japan. A flashback reveals that a blind swordfighter (Tetta Sugimoto) had placed her in the care of the wandering musicians when she was still a child. Now an adult, she is driven by the desire to find and reunite with this unnamed man who had once rescued her and whom she regards as her father. The film deliberately plays with the identity of her mentor, suggesting that he may even be the legendary blind swordsman Zatōichi. This connection is implied by their similar lightning-fast fighting style, reminiscent of the technique for which Zatōichi is renowned. Ichi herself has been taught this distinctive fighting style by her surrogate father, who visited her periodically when she was an adolescent, as a flashback reveals. Like Zatōichi in the film series, both Ichi and the unnamed swordfighter from her past wield a cane sword (shikomizue).
Sori’s female protagonist is depicted as exacting retribution for harm inflicted upon her, including the rape perpetrated by a male character. In contrast to Yuki, who has undergone a rigorous training regime turning her into a true killing machine, Ichi has primarily been taught by her mentor so that she can defend herself. However, both women are highly skilled combatants.

History and genre conventions
Ichi relies on the tradition of jidai geki (period films) and its subcategory the chanbara, swordfighting films. Quick midair drawing of the sword, slashing blades and acrobatic somersaults are part of the swordfighting choreography. Action is set in the 1830s/1840s, a period in which samurai were still the political rulers of Japan although the merchant class had accumulated the economic power to assume authority. In the social order established during the Tokugawa period, merchants belonged to the lowest rank (4), a status that was viewed with profound disdain by the samurai. Nevertheless, over the course of several centuries, their importance in Japanese society had increased exponentially.
Most of the narrative in Ichi takes place in the fictitious town of Bito. Once a vibrant post station (shukuba), it is now terrorized by a yakuza gang led by the brutal Banki (Shidō Nakamura). The Shirakawa clan, a group of chivalrous gamblers who are firmly integrated into the town’s social life is at risk of being eliminated by the bandits. The narrative of two rival gangs bears a striking resemblance to Akira Kurosawa’s renowned masterpiece Yojimbo (Yōjinbō, 1961). In Kurosawa’s jidai geki, a town is terrorized by yakuza gangs, who have been hired by two merchants in a bid to gain control of the region. In Yojimbo, the merchants are shown as exercising a dominant influence in social life of the town, this being an allusion to historical reality in the early nineteenth century and at the same time pointing to the importance of those with economic power in the context of post-war Japan.
In both films, the town that serves as a social microcosm is infested with corruption and crime. However, as in the first film in the Zatoichi series, the focus of Ichi is the conflict between two opposing yakuza gangs. Chōbei (Akira Emoto), the head of the Shirakawa clan who openly demonstrates his yakuza identity, is portrayed as a respectable and socially influential figure whose activities contribute positively to the town’s fortunes. His status within the community is further underscored by his formal attire when he welcomes an inspector from the shogunate, a scene that reinforces his position as a legitimate and respected member of the social order. In contrast, their hotchpotch clothes in garish colours and eye-catching patterns and wild hairstyles immediately identify the Banki gang as yakuza, the way they dress setting them apart from mainstream society.
The blue and grey kimonos worn by the men of the Shirakawa clan demonstrate the new social standing of these yakuza as fully integrated into the community. They are very clearly the “good” ones, defending a rightful cause against the “bad” Banki and his bandits. This portrayal of the Shirakawa clan follows the romanticized view of yakuza as honourable outlaws that is familiar from literature and cinema and also corresponds to the self-image of traditional yakuza (5). This romanticized image of the criminals in Ichi contrasts strongly with that in Kurosawa’s Yojimbo, where the two rival groups are both depicted as villainous.
While adhering to a conventional “good” versus “bad” narrative structure, Sori nevertheless emphasizes the hapless situation of outcasts such as Ichi and Banki. Banki was once a samurai but his face was disfigured by a burn, and this led to his expulsion from his clan and subsequent descent into criminality. Banki’s and also Ichi’s experiences are indicative of the widespread fear of physical disability in Japanese society. The ragged clothes worn by Ichi, in conjunction with the frequent shots of her and other visually-impaired musicians in the cold of winter, serve as a constant reminder of their impoverished existence on the margins of society.
However, the disabled in Ichi are presented as resourceful and particularly strong fighters. It is the inspector sent by the shogun who trembles with fear when threatened by one of Banki’s men. The samurai’s political impotence hints at the changing socio-political conditions in these last decades of the shogunate. It is, however, the character of Toma Fujihira (Takao Ōsawa), a samurai who meets Ichi by chance and remains by her side, who challenges and redefines conventional representations of masculinity and the warrior class. Although a formidable fighter with a wooden stick, Toma is unable to draw his sword. Hired by the Shirakawa as their yōjinbō, or bodyguard, he is unable to perform this task because of his inability. After their boss’s death, which he was not able to prevent, the vengeful Shirakawa brutally humiliate him, beating and kicking him.
Toma’s characterization contrasts sharply with the conventional image of the heroic samurai. He is a “fake hero” – a pretender whose reputation is built on a lie. The Shirakawa hired him because they believed that he had killed five of Banki’s men. In fact, it was Ichi who killed them to rescue Toma from death at the hands of the bandits. However, he does not set the record straight and although he feels remorse about taking credit for Ichi’s achievements, he does not reveal the truth. His silence on this therefore reinforces the film’s critique of masculine heroism. Toma’s behaviour exposes the discrepancy between the image of the invincible samurai and the vulnerability of the man behind that image.

De- and reconstructing traditional gender roles
Haruka Ayase plays the demanding role of the blind woman in a highly convincing manner with restrained expressions and gestures. This sober portrayal of the female protagonist follows jidai geki conventions in their representation of stoic, self-controlled swordsmen. She is a superheroine with the sword, refuting the commonly held belief that a woman’s role is that of the victim. The insistence on her fighting skills may, at first glance, seem simply a reversal of gender roles and genre conventions, with Ichi portrayed as a woman in a role traditionally associated with men. Her reluctance to engage in fights that do not concern her recalls numerous heroes in American westerns. She advises Toma against fighting for the Shirakawa clan because becoming involved in matters that concern only other people bears risks. However, her pilgrimage is determined not only by the search for her fatherly mentor and is also portrayed as the painful quest for a sense in life. Snow becomes a symbol of a world lacking the human warmth that Ichi – perhaps unconsciously – is looking for.
The portrayal of the male protagonist, Toma, and the deconstruction of masculinity contribute to the establishment of a central female figure, and here too, external motifs are brought to the fore. Toma’s repeated desperate attempts to draw his sword from its sheath allude to Freudian theories of castration anxiety. Just as Ichi is traumatized by her experience of loss, Toma’s inability to fight with a sword is similarly explained as the result of a childhood trauma.
The character Toma can be read as a deliberate subversion of the conventional ideal of samurai masculinity, traditionally associated with physical strength and emotional restraint. Rather than conforming to this archetype, Toma is characterized by a need to express himself verbally, by animated gestures, and by visible emotionalism. This is particularly evident in the scene following his first encounter with Ichi, in which his loquacious and expressive behaviour contrasts sharply with Ichi’s reserved demeanour. His frequent moments of comic relief, at times approaching slapstick, further destabilize the image of the samurai as a figure exhibiting serious and controlled masculine authority.
However, Toma’s lack of conventional masculinity in the film does not diminish his status. His emotional openness coexists with qualities traditionally coded as masculine such as courage, chivalry and a willingness to protect and care for others. In this sense, Toma represents a more differentiated model of masculinity in which emotional expressiveness and vulnerability are compatible with strength and honour. As a character, he therefore challenges the assumption that masculine identity must be grounded in stoicism and the suppression of emotions. This emerges as particularly significant in his relationship with Ichi. While Ichi exhibits a more conventional form of restrained and emotionally opaque behaviour that is strongly influenced by traditional representations of masculinity, Toma’s openness reveals the limitations of this kind of emotional detachment.

East meets West
In the last part of the film, Ichi has exchanged the rags she has so far worn for an elegant kimono and outer garments with highly symbolic meaning. Over the kimono she wears Toma’s green coat as an expression of honour for the man who has devoted his life to her and a light, black overcoat reminiscent of the kind worn by Zen Buddhist monks in a reference to their ideals of harmony and inner peace. In Bito, Ichi has found the path leading to enlightenment. She says to the boy Kotarō (Ryōsuke Shima), another character besides Toma whose kindness has touched her, that he has brought light into her life. This is a reference back to a sequence earlier in the film when the boy mistakenly brings Ichi a lantern which she clearly does not need. Here too, the focus is on an object that has a second, spiritual meaning. Ichi is now able to see the “inner light” and find the sense of humanity she has been longing for.

Conclusion
Ichi does not delve into the psychology of its protagonists, and its references to elements in other cinematic works (6) are often only superficial. However, its nuanced portrayal of the two main protagonists succeeds in reconstructing and redefining gender roles. The juxtaposition of seemingly contradictory attitudes such as strength and vulnerability allows the film to present gender roles not as a fixed identities but as something that is constructed, performed and can potentially be reconfigured.

Notes
(1) The first of the 26 films with Shintarō Katsu was released in 1962 and the last in 1989. In 2003, Takeshi Kitano directed Zatoichi: The Blind Swordsman (Zatōichi), a reboot of the popular franchise, in which he also starred.
(2) In the name Zatōichi, the part “zatō” refers to a blind masseur or musician in historical Japan. “Ichi” is the given name of both protagonists. “Zatō” was the lowest of four ranks in the Tōdōza, a guild created for blind persons during the Tokugawa or Edo period (1603-1868). Because blind people were subject to strict social stratification and had only limited employment options, they often worked as musicians or massage therapists (anma). Over time, “zatō” became synonymous with “blind person”.
(3) Fujita’s Lady Snowblood inspired Quentin Tarantino’s two Kill Bill films (USA, 2003/2004).
(4) In the Tokugawa period, the social order comprised four distinct classes: samurai, peasants, artisans and merchants.
(5) Traditional yakuza like to refer to themselves as ninkyō dantai (chivalrous organization). The Shirakawa clan is modelled on this idealized image of community-focused yakuza who act as protectors of a town.
(6) In the showdown scene between the two gangs, the dusty main street of the small town resembles very closely the street in Yojimbo. The setting in both films also clearly evokes the western, with a shop sign rattling in the wind in Ichi a further reminder of this Hollywood genre. And the film’s final sequence, in which the boy Kotarō calls after Ichi, asking if they will see each other again, is very similar to the final shots in George Stevens’s western Shane (USA, 1953).In a further parallel, the use of close-ups of Toma’s eyes in the duel scene with Banki recalls Sergio Leone’s framing and editing techniques in his spaghetti westerns.


by Andrea Grunert

During his distinguished career as a director, Masato Harada (1949-2025), who passed away in December 2025, explored the pervasive nature of systemic corruption in Japanese society. Films such as Kamikaze Taxi (Fukushu no Tenshi, 1995), Spellbound (Jukaku, 1999), Killing for the Prosecution (Kensatsu gawa no zainin, 2018), Hell Dogs (Heru doggusu, 2022) and Bad Lands (2023) examine the complex intersections of politics, economics and crime, highlighting the often-blurred boundaries between these spheres. This article takes a closer look at Killing for the Prosecution, revealing the blurred lines between justice and crime.

A tale of revenge
In Killing for the Prosecution, the protagonist Takeshi Mogami (Takuya Kimura), is introduced as a public prosecutor who espouses an ideal of justice grounded in the pursuit of truth. During a law seminar, he asserts that a prosecutor who becomes committed to a narrative of his own making ceases to serve the law and instead undermines it. Several years later, Keiichirō Ōkino (Kazunari Ninomiya), one of the seminar attendees, joins Mogami at the Criminal Investigation Division. As Ōkino works alongside the man he admires, he gradually encounters a more ambiguous and troubling side of his mentor, prompting him to question both Mogami’s integrity and the ideals of justice he once championed.
One of the suspects in the murder case of an elderly couple is Shigeo Matsukura (Yoshi Sakō). It was revealed to the police that he and his older brother, who were both adolescents at the time, had committed the abduction and rape of a young girl. In an effort to conceal their crime, the perpetrators subsequently took the lives of their victim, in addition to the victim’s parents and brother. The sixteen-year-old Matsukura, was sentenced to five years’ imprisonment while his brother took his own life. Furthermore, Matsukura was the primary suspect in a separate murder case that occurred sixteen years prior to the murder of the elderly couple. On this occasion, the victim was a young student named Yuki, who was killed in her final year in middle school [That means that she was around fifteen years old, when she died; author’s note]. As Matsukura had remained stubbornly silent throughout all the interrogations, it had not been possible to prove his guilt. He had to be released and Yuki’s murder remained unsolved. Mogami is convinced that Matsukura is responsible for Yuki’s death. Yet he has a much deeper reason to convict the suspect. Brief flashbacks reveal that Mogami was friends with Yuki, and indeed was in love with her.
It is evident that Mogami swiftly directs the investigative efforts towards Matsukura. He wants the man found guilty at any cost. Especially since, during an interrogation conducted by Ōkino – which Mogami is overhearing from another room –, Matsukura confesses to Yuki’s murder. He even relishes revealing his guilt, because he knows that he can no longer be convicted of this crime, as the statute of limitations had expired [It was only in 2010 that a law was passed removing the statute of limitations for capital offence; author’s note]. The situation presents a dilemma for Mogami, who is becoming increasingly obsessed with Matsukura whom he wants to charge and convict for the latest murder. When another suspect emerges and the police begins to focus their attention on him, Mogami resorts to extreme measures, taking the law into his own hands.
Revenge is a universal theme and a persistent feature of Japanese culture. Its best-known example is arguably the story of the 47 ronin who avenged their lord’s honour in the early eighteenth century. In the annals of cinematic history, Akira Kurosawa’s seminal work The Bad Sleep Well (Warui yatsu hodo yoku nemuru, 1960) serves as another poignant example. Kurosawa’s film offers a compelling narrative that portrays self-justice as a desperate measure within a profoundly corrupt system, where the intertwined forces of politics, industry and organised crime perpetuate a pervasive sense of despair and hopelessness. In Harada’s Hell Dogs, the protagonist Gorō Idezuki (Jun’ichi Okada) is a police officer who has infiltrated a yakuza clan. The setting is the world of organised crime which is depicted as a violent underworld working under the disguise of a modern enterprise operating at a global level. In Akio Fukamachi’s novel Takenōchi-ke, the source material on which Hell Dogs is based, the emphasis is placed on Gorō’s identity crisis, his growing identification with his yakuza role and his disgust for the violent and not always legal methods of his superior at the police which come close to self-justice. In contrast, Harada shifts the focus on the ardent desire of revenge which determine Gorō’s actions. The protagonist is depicted as a solitary figure, embodying the archetype of the lone wolf hero. However, this persona is juxtaposed with the character’s profound personal trauma, stemming from his professional failure as a police officer to save the life of a woman he had a romantic attachment to. The police unit that recruited Gorō as an undercover agent operates covertly as a shadow organisation with the objective of targeting organised crime and dismantling the yakuza clan. It is evident that the objective of the mission is to perpetrate murder, a blatant contravention of the law. Hell Dogs provides no explanation as to who commissioned or controls the secret unit. The mere existence of such phenomena is indicative of systemic weakness within the legal system and wider society.

Beyond the law
Mogami is culpable of violating the law, fabricating evidence, collaborating with the yakuza and ultimately taking a life in order to bring Yuki’s murderer before the courts and secure a death sentence. Although his actions appear motivated by a desire for vengeance, they are nevertheless characterised by careful deliberation. While the film depicts him as committing a grave act of violence, it simultaneously cultivates ambiguity regarding the extent of his moral corruption, leaving open the question of whether he is as cold-blooded as his actions imply. As he unloads the gun he intends to use to kill his victim, he experiences a bout of vomiting. His ambiguity is also expressed by the trauma he suffers from after Yuki’s the murder. He seems to live primarily for his job. A few brief scenes depicting his private life make it clear that he is in a loveless marriage. In this respect, the character conforms to genre conventions. Nevertheless, there are also scenes that show Mogami in a private setting with friends and colleagues, which gives Takuya Kimura the opportunity to demonstrate a wider range of expressions – an opportunity he makes compelling use of.
Mogami has constructed a narrative of Matsukura’s guilt and is determined to uphold it at any cost. This determination leads him to manipulate those working alongside him, including Ōkino. The younger man remains committed to an idealised conception of justice, one that Mogami himself had promoted in the past. In response to a colleague’s remark that justice is a “hypocritical fantasy,” Ōkino replies: “I’m carrying the torch for Mogami’s justice.” But as he gradually realises that his superior’s actions are driven by a desire for retribution, he begins to question his behaviour. He reminds Mogami of his own words: “A prosecutor who is obsessed with his own idea of justice becomes a criminal.”

Law and justice in a broader context
While Ōkino remains committed to the truth and vents his frustration, Mogami defends his version of events: “Times change. So does justice. Today you must be obsessed with justice to be strong.” Above all, however, he justifies himself by emphasising his importance within the system as a public prosecutor who combats corruption. Alongside the revenge story, Harada develops a subplot in which Kazuki Tanno (Takehiro Hira), Mogami‘s friend since middle school, has been arrested for bribery. It turns out that Tanno is a victim of the scheming of his fabulously wealthy father-in-law, a politician tipped to be the next prime minister.
Harada takes a critical look at a political system that is rotten to the core. Mogami can only carry out his revenge with the help of the yakuza. In Killing for the Prosecution, the connection between the legal system and organised crime is driven by personal motives. These, however, suggest deeper and more complex connections between justice and crime. The relationship between Mogami and Suwabe (Yutaka Matsushige), a fixer for the yakuza he asks for help, is explained in the frame of Japan’s wartime past. Mogami’s grandfather and Suwabe’s father were both survivors of the 1944 Battle of Imphal, a devastating defeat for the Japanese Imperial Army. Suwabe expresses an lifelong gratitude to Mogami and his family, because Mogami’s grandfather rescued his father during the campaign. In a dream, Mogami is haunted by visions of the Japanese Imperial army’s harrowing retreat, which claimed the lives of thousands of soldiers. He sees himself surrounded by men dying from starvation and disease, caught amid the suffering and the chaos of the withdrawal.
The wartime subject is indicative of an unresolved past that continues to exert a profound influence of Japanese society, transcending temporal boundaries and spanning multiple generations. The one-sided portrayal of Japanese soldiers as victims can be viewed critically. Nevertheless, the collective memory of a nation that has sacrificed its own people – soldiers and civilians alike – is also an important factor that contributed to the rise of pacifism in post-war Japan. Pacifism is increasingly under threat in twenty-first century Japan. In his film, Harada explores the close connection between the legacy of World War II and contemporary anxieties surrounding remilitarisation. While Tanno’s father-in-law supports remilitarisation, Mogami maintains that prosecutors such as himself are essential to preventing both remilitarisation and the emergence of a new dictatorship.
The wartime experience can also be interpreted as a metaphor for the state of the legal system. The Battle of Imphal is regarded as one of Japan’s most poorly planned wartime operations. Harada draws a parallel between the inflexibility of many Japanese military commanders, who sacrificed their soldiers during the war, and Japan’s contemporary legal system, which is portrayed as rigid and deeply flawed. However, Mogami’s actions contradict his intentions, evoking the dogmatic authoritarianism that afflicted his grandfather’s generation.

Order and chaos
Although Ōkino does not accept Mogami’s justifications, the latter’s crimes suddenly seem trivial compared to those of the wartime Japanese military government or the machinations of certain politicians. However, the film does not descend into populist discourse, partly because it focuses on the moral dilemma that both Mogami and Ōkino have to face.
Although they are only addressed superficially, wartime history, re-militarisation and corruption at the top of the political hierarchy are elegantly integrated into the narrative. This also applies to the brief sequence in which demonstrators campaigning for a driving ban on elderly road users can be seen in the background. Later, when an elderly driver appears to have caused a fatal accident, the political campaign takes on an unexpected resonance in the narrative. Furthermore, Harada, an admirer of classic Hollywood cinema and jazz music, elegantly incorporates a song by Dinah Washington, a singer that Yuki liked, into the soundtrack. The term “elegant” is also applicable to the visual design which is characterised by opulent framing, lighting and camera movements. Numerous shots of modern towers, an architecture dominated by glass and metal, linearity and shades of grey and blue suggest a world in order. These shots are in stark contrast with the carnivalesque atmosphere in a narrow street where street artists perform and people feast. Not less chaotic is the party sequence in which Matsukura and his lawyers celebrate their success, Matsukura having been found not guilty in the murder case of the elderly couple. Tanno’s funeral service seems just as much as a farce, with professional mourners moving rhythmically in front of a huge portrait of the deceased who has been sacrificed by his father-in-law.

Critical views on the legal system
Harada’s film is divided into three chapters, with each chapter being represented by a tarot card. The initial chapters bear the titles “The Magicians” and “The Judgment”, respectively, while the concluding chapter is entitled “The Fool”. One may ask whether Mogami resembles the Fool in the tarot, in the sense that he cannot be captured by his opponents and is therefore invulnerable to defeat. Matsukura is depicted in a highly negative light, as a monster, an unpleasant and abject individual, on the verge of madness, a person who disrupts the established order. This clichéd depiction of the villain serves to mitigate the perceived culpability of the prosecutor. Nevertheless, Harada refrains from straightforward identification with Mogami, whose actions are challenged by Ōkino’s pursuit of truth.
The search for truth is a prominent theme in many recent Japanese television series taking place in the world of law and justice. 99.9 – Criminal Lawyer (2016, 2018 and 2021), Ichikei’s Crow – The Criminal Court Judges (2021), Antihero (2024), Destiny (2024), Okura- Cold Case Investigation (2024), Sins of Kujo (2026) and Tarusagi Bros. (2026) deal with corruption and illegal means made use of by the police and/or the prosecution. Mogami is advised by a superior to hand over the new murder case rather than risk losing it. This is explained by the pressure on Japanese prosecutors to achieve a 99.9 % conviction rate, a theme that lies at the heart of the series 99.9% – Criminal Lawyer. Tarusagi Bros. centres on the themes of revenge and the statute of limitations: two brothers, both police officers, seek revenge for the murder of their parents which occurred before the new law abolishing limitation came into effect.
Killing for the Prosecution deals very obviously with topics which concern present-day Japan without delving deeply enough into most of its themes. This apparent superficiality might leave viewers feeling dissatisfied and it negatively impacts the critical portrayal of the legal system. However, the conflicting motivations that drive the main characters produce nuanced human portraits and expose the moral ambiguity at the heart of the narrative, inviting viewers to draw their own conclusions.

by Andrea Grunert

Shinji Araki, whom I interviewed in 2024 (1), has kindly given me access to his new work, the short film The Temptation I Had (Sono yuwaku). His first long feature, The Town of Headcounts (Ninzū no machi, 2020), is set in the future while keeping elements of the contemporary world, and Penalty Loop (Peneruti rupu, 2024 [2]) is a mixture of a variety of genres in which fantasy elements intrude into everyday life situations. As well as being highly gripping, both films offer deep reflections on individual responsibility and humanity.
The 30-minutes-long The Temptation I Had also blends present-day reality and fantasy. Most of the action takes place in the apartment in which Kaori (Risa Asanuma) and Takao (Tomomitsu Adachi) live and is anything but futuristic. The outside takes are of ordinary settings: a road intersection filmed from a bird’s eye view, a modern apartment building, an empty plot of land … At first glance, all seems absolutely trivial. However, there is a lingering uneasiness that is created by the voice-over. While the camera captures moments in the couple’s daily life in their private space, Kaori’s voice reveals her concerns about changes in her husband’s behaviour. His habits are not the same as they used to be. The Italian-style noodles he normally prepares so well are suddenly tasteless, whereas the Japanese dishes – usually not his forte – are excellent. The way he uses the vacuum cleaner to clean the floor is also different. And even his physical shape seems to have undergone some strange transformation.
The voice-over reveals the young woman’s inner feelings. She also shares her thoughts with a female friend – Rika (Rio Kanno) – with whom she exchanges text messages. The voice-over and the messages, which are superimposed on images of Kaori, express her misgivings, which are at the core of the narration. Both the voice-over and the text messages add meaning to the images.
The questions Kaori asks herself imbue the film with latent tension, creating moments of suspense. The separation of image and sound together with the text messages, which appear as on the screen of a smartphone, heighten the film’s appeal and create emotional distance. They also contribute to the feeling of mystery that permeates The Temptation I Had. As in Penalty Loop, in which the uncanny pervades the protagonist’s daily life, no special effects are needed to create the realm of fantasy. In Penalty Loop, the futuristic-looking hydroponic plant factory creates an eerie feeling of unfamiliarity. In The Temptation I Had, the bare concrete walls of the apartment or even the bird’s eye’s view of the intersection or the fact that the streets are devoid of cars and pedestrians contribute to the suspense.
Although Rika finds rational answers to her friend’s concerns, the story evolves towards the fantastic. It is in the last part of the film that the uncanny is fully revealed. A dialogue sequence allows the viewers to conclude that despite the overall visual design, which is clearly realistic, they are watching a mystery film.
I will try to avoid spoilers by not providing further clues, but one other key motif, namely desire, can be mentioned without revealing the explanations for Kaori’s worries. In the disguise of the fantastic, Araki deals with questions of sexuality and gender, homosexual desire and sexual identity, and in fact, hidden desires are at the core of his short film. In Penalty Loop, the time-loop narrative is the frame for reflections on guilt and revenge, murder and grief. In The Temptation I Had, the clash between everyday life and fantasy is linked to an unexpected story about desire and hidden feelings.
As in Penalty Loop, there are frequent shots of a tree, its leaves whipped by the wind. Nature is shown as a realm beyond the private space of the apartment in which most of the action takes place. It also alludes to spirituality and inner life and to the magic of nature, so different from the concrete buildings and the tarmac dominating the urban environment. And, as often in Japanese, films, these isolated shots may well not be in any way related to the narration but function instead as a break in the story. Some of the images are beautifully arranged, such as the symmetrical shot of a concrete wall in front of which is a table with a flower in a vase and a glass of wine, evoking a still life. This shot is a clear indication of Araki’s undeniable interest in painting. There is not much music on the sound track except for a few sequences, in particular the one of Kaori and Takao’s passionate lovemaking (3). In general, silence prevails and thereby heightens the feeling of mystery. The slow pace of the narration also invites reflection and at the same time intensifies the latent tension. The atmospheric density that Araki succeeds in creating makes The Temptation I Had a film that is both stimulating and entertaining.

(1)  Interview with Filmmaker Shinji Araki

(2) Penalty Loop

(3) The music was written by Ayane Kondō.