A real shame

Rating: 3/10 (1 April 2005)

I'm afraid I have to agree with the naysayers here - I found the film overlong and difficult to watch (but not in a good way). This was all the more disappointing because I do enjoy films based around character studies just as much as I can enjoy a good action movie or period drama. The problem for me was that the film just gives too little insight into the leading characters - for the first half of the film we get almost no clue as to the motivations of the two leads. This alienates the viewer and makes the characters just as much emotional ciphers as any square-jawed hero in a summer blockbuster. A character study lives or dies by engaging the audience's interest in the characters, but instead of concentrating on this aspect, huge swathes of the film are wasted on showing Tokyo cityscapes and background shots - beautiful, but it feels like just so much padding that is one more barrier between the audience and the characters. I really did want to like this movie but it left me completely cold - if you want to see a character study movie done well check out Mike Leigh's "Secrets and Lies" instead