The orchestra where our protagonist - a cello player played has been disbanded. He realises he is not talented enough to continue as cello player but not before he has spent a few million on a new cello. At this point we are drawn in by the story. He encounters a live octopus, sells his cello and moves with his wife to the countryside into a cafe/house his mom left for him when she died. He is broke and has an irritating wife who keeps smiling (he doesn't think so, but I do) A chance ad leads to a job cleaning, decorating and encoffining dead people (yes I know, you have to be dead to be encoffined - a word I learnt from the subtitles :)) This gives the script a chance to go into dead body humour, heart wrenching sobbing etc etc.
The plight of lonely old women, shunning of people who handle dead bodies, lost fathers and scarred childhoods is all handled in between scenes of the hero playing cello in the green japanese countryside with geese and flowers for company. (Very DDLJ)
I'm not saying it was a bad movie, apart from the wife, everybody else did a decent job. There are a few funny and a few touching scenes and overall it is a sweet movie. The rituals shown are really fascinating and among the best portions of the movie. And maybe if had not won an Oscar for best foreign language film, I might have been a little less harsh in judging it.
1 comment:
I loved that music(hero playing the cello) .. Personally I felt all the movies in this category(2008 best foreign film) were worth an Oscar ..
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