MUBI

Screened at Melbourne International Film Festival 2010.

It is a beautiful morning in Tokyo trough the eyes of Nozomi, an Air Doll (sex doll) who has magically come to life. Everyday when his pervert owner leaves to work, she explores the city and we follow her day to day encounters with strangers and her attempts to look and behave more and more like a human being. Eventually she finds a job at a video store and falls in love with one of the clerks. “I found a heart, and now I am brokenhearted”. But soon enough after she starts experiencing real feelings, she discovers the philosophical questions that hunt most of us. Why are we here, where do we come from, what is love ?.

Writer Director Hirokazu Kore-Eda exposes this and more philosophical questions right from the beginning and trough the film, focusing mainly on a strong analogy: Most of humans are also empty inside, are we really that different to a plastic doll ?. This repeating theme on the film creates an interesting premise, but the story lingers for too long without any real conflict until the audience has lost interest on the character, regardless of the fantastic performance of Doona Bae. And some very superb cinematographic moments shoot on the streets of Tokyo. A bit out of the sudden and into the third act the filmmaker twists the film into a very dark down path for the charismatic and innocent character, but it is too late to change genres and what is left at the end although very symbolic and beautiful is an unsatisfactory story.

Philosophical questions about morals, consumerism, plastic lives, love, substitutions, life and death, child’s innocence, loneliness are exemplified by cutting into the lives of other strangers, which most of the time is done with elegant poetry and visuals, but these are edited like a sort of interludes within the film which didn’t help me feel more interested in the film.

I enjoyed the start and the end of the film, it has a great concept, lost of cute moments where you can’t help but smile or sex references that make you gasp, but once I understood what the director was trying to say I wanted less poetry and long shoots and more story that was not delivered. I came out thinking “this could have been a great short film”.

I’ll give it 2.5 stars.

Ivan Tinoco,
July 24, 2010

I’ve only read two reviews so far, one on a Japanese blog, and one on this site, both of which tsk-tsk’ed at the film. In fact, the Japanese reviewer named “Daremo shiranai” as Koreeda’s peak, and went on to say that he’s drunk on his own glory, e.g. Air Doll.

Well, even if that is the consensus, I hope people will see and feel differently about this film. In my head I’m not even going to compare it to Maboroshi no hikari, which speaks a different tongue than Air Doll.

It’s a film that is at once visually rockin’, and that makes you think. About what? Some might just see dull metaphors, like a doll that magically gets a breath of life, walks around town looking at everything with the innocence of a child, and that’s the whole point- we’re empty shells walking around taking everything for granted.. yawn. However, I see her little forays as an interlude, and for the most part, this is one heavy film. Granted there’s a lot of symbolism, but it isn’t the cheap kind. It’s a deconstruction of relationships- mainly man and woman, us and the outside world- what makes us human. And somehow it doesn’t seem like a pedantic sermon.

For the Japanese society, this is a very revealing film about how men treat women, so I also thought about it from that perspective. That’s where all that talk about “substitutes” lead me. It’s easier to limit yourself to a make-believe world of life-size dolls, meido-cafes, fetish porn- than actually have a relationship. I didn’t like the scene where Nozomi confronted her “owner”- the dialogue seemed forced, except for one part, where the guy obviously hates having a real discussion about how she feels, and calls her 面倒臭い – which is “irritating nuisance” times 10. This tells us a lot about how the Japanese deal (or don’t deal) with relationships- hence the safe haven of a virtual relationship. The most disturbing scene was with her co-worker she falls for, towards the end (can’t give away too much). I am still left pondering about that one, and her reaction.
I’m going to have to see it again, but not too soon.