Reviews of Children in the Wind
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Stephen Prokow
9Apr11
Hiroshi Shimizu’s Children in the Wind is about children, to put it frankly. Not delinquent children, but children who get in trouble and learn from their mistakes. However, being set in 1930’s Japan, the term delinquent could be used thoroughly.
The film starts with brothers Zenta and Sampei being told to stop playing, and to study by their mother during dinner. Zenta is then asked by his mother to bring lunch to his father, with Sampei being told to study. This becomes a repetitious theme as Zenta is always asked to bring his father lunch. As he is older, his mother trusts him because he has maturity on his side. Sampei is jealous and calls his brother the teacher’s pet.
However, the real story coincides with the brothers’ father being fired from his job and arrested for embezzlement. The brothers’ mother looks for work while her husband is away. In the meantime, Sampei is sent to live with a retired schoolmaster, but can’t stop getting in trouble. At the end of the film, the boys return home to their parents. The last scene with the parade, and the brothers’ welcoming Kintaro (a boy who they have been bullying for the whole of the film) as their friend was a magnificent ending to such an elegant, but simple story.
As I mentioned, a film with a simple story and not a strong message in my opinion, Children with the Wind still can be considered a spiritual film. However, I took the relationship of the mother wanting her children to succeed as a very serious point. The children are children, so let them act like children. In today’s world, and especially in America, children are rarely told to study at that age. Parents want their children to succeed, but expect much less. I’m not arguing any way is better and I certainly am not an expert at this as I don’t have any children, but I feel that point represented the time period and Japan in perfect representation.
If I did get any message through the story, it was the brothers’ accepting Kintaro as a friend. I am connecting that with growing up and their mother forcing the kids to study (especially Sampei). I felt it was a simple message, but what else can you expect from a film made 73 years ago.
Yet, the main reason I enjoy this film is because of the way it was put together. Such a simple, elegant story was flourished with dazzling long takes and gorgeous scenery. Children in the Wind utilizes many techniques we take for granted today as Shimizu was a filmmaker who knew how to verse his stories as moving images, and that is what I enjoy most about his work and this film.
- Currently 4.0/5 Stars.
Brad S.
4Jun10
Hiroshi Shimizu’s Children of the Wind takes an outsider looking in point of view. Looking through the eyes of children as they try to perceive the problems of the adult world. It follows two young Japanese brothers who must cope with their father’s firing, arrest and their subsequent relocation. The younger brother, Sampei, reacts by acting out (not that he wasn’t a handful to begin with), putting himself in dangerous situations and generally driving the relatives caring for him crazy.
The plot is very basic and, if it were made in Hollywood, would probably showcase the adorableness of the kids and milk the melodrama for all it was worth. Happily, Shimizu does not pander and his child performers are not cutesy, but naturalistic. Early scenes of neighborhood children running wild gave the impression that they were one plane crash away from going completely Lord of the Flies on each other. It’s been commented that the kids can be pretty annoying, which is true, but also true of many of their real life counterparts. The parents, however, remain strangely passive, preferring to teach by example, I suppose.
In addition to offering a perceptive view of family dynamics, Children in the Wind also has a strong visual sense. The framing, in particular, stands out. Look at the house scene where we see through a translucent drapery at the adults in the center of the frame, while the children are sleeping/listening from their beds in the bottom corner of the screen. Until they start to move, we could miss that they’ve been on screen the whole time. There are also plenty of humorous bits of business that keep the film lively, like the scene where Sampei attempts to reach his father’s hat hanging on the office wall.
- Currently 3.0/5 Stars.