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By Brian Lafferty
March 22, 2012 (San Diego) – My first exposure to Vietnamese director Anh Hung Tran was in my Language of Film class at California State University, Fullerton. In this class, we had to watch at least two to three movies per week to analyze such film grammar as movement, color, rhythm, lines, space, etc.
During this time I was exposed to such acclaimed directors as Carl Theodor Dreyer (The Passion of Joan of Arc), Peter Greenaway (A Zed and Two Naughts), Rainer Werner Fassbinder (Lola), and Nicholas Roeg (Don’t Look Now). One week I watched Tran’s Cyclo. It was an unforgettable film, a dark, gritty and seedy story about a young rickshaw driver’s involvement in Saigon’s criminal underground. I saw about three dozen movies for that course alone, and Cyclo remains one of the very few that’s stuck with me five years later.
Norwegian Wood previously played at last year’s San Diego Asian Film Festival and, thanks to the Reading Gaslamp, opens for one week. An adaptation of Haruki Murakami’s novel of the same name, it opens in 1967. Toru Watanabe (Ken’ichi Matsuyama) recalls a dark period of his life that commenced with his best friend Kizuki’s (Kengo Kora) suicide. He develops a romance with the now-mentally unstable Naoko that sends her further over the edge. Meanwhile, he harbors a hesitant love for Midori, a fellow student.
The performances are understated and soft. Watanabe is often pensive. A whole lot runs through his mind. He doesn’t talk much, but he thinks a lot. Rinko Kihuchi gives the most accurate depressed performance since Kirsten Dunst in Melancholia. Tran elicits from her a range of emotions, from shame to sorrow to anguish.
The cinematography is as soft as the performances. Tran colors night scenes with a blue reminiscent of raindrops. The often-overcast skies parallel the characters’ depression. Kizuki’s suicide is filmed with a stark shade of red, as if Kizuki was about to go to Hell. I recall in Dante’s Inferno the part where Dante and Virgil encounter those who committed suicide. Those who offed themselves were forever cursed as immovable trees, forever fed upon by the vicious Harpies.
Watching Norwegian Wood is similar to reading a dense novel. The story itself isn’t complicated; in the abstract, it’s about a young man who struggles with his love between two women.
What densifies Norwegian Wood is the ultra-complex characters and expression of the film’s ideas and themes. Even at slightly over two hours, the film feels packed. Tran has many thoughts and he squeezes as many as he can into a manageable running time. The film feels long, but it’s a rewarding type of long.
Oddly, despite this packed feeling, I felt something was missing. Norwegian Wood doesn't have much soul. Tran’s script is filled with ideas, but it doesn’t give me a true sense of what Watanabe is feeling or what’s going through his mind. I can see he’s troubled, as is Naoko. But I don’t see what ‘s truly eating at them. I only see the surface. Good surface, but I wanted to see more of what's behind it.
Despite the film’s incompleteness, what remains is a worthy choice for your moviegoing dollars.
B
Norwegian Wood opens tomorrow at the Reading Gaslamp.
A Red Flag release. Director: Anh Hung Tran. Screenplay: Anh Hung Tran, based on the novel by Haruki Murakami. Original Music: Jonny Greenwood. Cinematography: Ping Bin Lee. Cast: Ken’ichi Matsuyama, Rinko Kikuchi, Kiki Mizuhara, Eriko Hatsune, and Kengo Kora. 133 minutes. Unrated.
Brian Lafferty can be reached at brian@eastcountymagazine.org. You can also follow him on Twitter: @BrianLaff.
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