In the visual novel and anime, Farewell Song, Akihiko is an ex military Humvee pilot and his life after the defeat of World War III.
Akihiko Shiota has carved out his own place in the vast panorama of Japanese adolescent cinema. Shiota’s photographs of lost teenagers are known for their distant, unceremonious presentation and pessimistic attitude on human behavior. Since his feature-length debut, Moonlight Whispers, an eye-opening investigation of sexual desire, loneliness, and unbalanced relationships in adolescence, he has shown this.
We examine at how Shiota’s directorial approach opens up varied contemplations on the futility of conquering life’s challenges as part of Japan Society’s Flash Forward program, which is presenting a double bill of Shiota’s Harmful Insect and Farewell Song.
Insects that are harmful (2001)
Harmful Insect is a dismal account of a young girl’s tragedies that was released barely two years after Moonlight Whispers. The stunning performances of its youthful ensemble, led by Aoi Miyazaki and Yu Aoi, make the drama all the more tragic.
Sachiko (Aoi Miyazaki), a middle-schooler, has endured trauma much beyond her years. Her home life is far from pleasant, with an absent father and an unstable mother. When she goes to school, things aren’t any better. Sachiko’s family and sexual involvement with a teacher are gossiped about by her classmates, with only Natsuko (Yu Aoi) showing her any care. Despite Natsuko’s best efforts to befriend and support Sachiko, she is faced with opposition. Sachiko, on the other hand, finds more common ground with her older con artist lover and their homeless acquaintance who live on the outside of society.
Despite Kiyono Yayoi’s horrific plot, Shiota’s subtle directing of the mise-en-scene as well as his youthful star is far from exploitative. Sachiko’s exclusion and suffering are imbued with a feeling of resignation and almost banality by him. Sachiko is particularly still in busy classroom situations, her eyes down amid a sea of laughing and squirming youngsters. Her unblinking glance implies that she has grown used to seeing her suicidal mother break down in the middle of the night.
Sachiko’s emotional isolation from her surroundings is a survival tactic, according to Miyazaki, who says, “Although Sachiko seems like an adult on the outside, she is not one on the inside, [yet] she is obliged to live like way.”
Harmful Insect continuously reminds us that Sachiko is still a thirteen-year-old girl, despite her efforts at what she considers as adulthood. The most prominent instances include Sachiko always wearing a school uniform, a letter from her teacher advising her she should be “dating males her own age,” and Natsuko screaming that they are “just in seventh grade, why does [Sachiko] have to suffer so much?”
But there are also Sachiko’s own acts to consider. Her stern facade is shaken in tiny times, most joyously when she grins at an adorable puppy or chats to a neighborhood youngster, and more dangerously when she escapes predators’ grip. When she burns down her family house in a short-sighted act of defiance and catharsis, the fragility of her facade is most evident. Sachiko is first overjoyed when her house begins to catch fire. But, when the gravity of what she’s done sinks in, she cries up for the first time. Cuts and cinematography are utilized to great effect to underscore her lack of control as she is enveloped in darkness with just the flames of her house lighting her face. Sachiko steps out of the frame, only to be re-captured by a closer lens, each cut revealing her to be more upset on the outside.
Sachiko’s future seems to be bleak as the film comes to a quietly heartbreaking end. Sachiko’s navigation of a world harmful to young girls is now faced with a knowledge that life is unjust, rather than naivety or evasion. Miyazaki’s modest portrayal as Sachiko leaves her hometown tells it all: her eyes go from dread and remorse to tepid acceptance in a matter of seconds. Sachiko has little hope, and Harmful Insect creates an equally distressing feeling of pessimism in spectators with such a constant defeatist tone till the credits.
Song of Farewell (2019)
Shiota’s 2019 music-filled Farewell Song, over two decades after Harmful Insect, is an unexpectedly marketable and fairly cheery entry compared to the rest of his youth cinema career.
We first encounter HaruLeo, an indie darling band, near the conclusion of their career, about to go on one more tour before splitting up. The band travels around Japan with their manager Shima (Ryô Narita), and is led by vocalists Haru (Mugi Kadowaki) and Leo (Nana Komatsu). Haru, Leo, and Shima ponder on their relationships while on tour, unearthing a long-standing love triangle they vowed they’d never act on.
Despite the fact that the road trip framework provides the ideal metaphor for metamorphosis, Haru and Leo are a tenacious continuation of Shiota’s concern with stasis – although with a very different perspective.
Shiota uses the music as speech to examine the nature of HaruLeo’s relationship, since he is the only writer for Farewell Song. Shiota utilizes the interaction between vocalists in the song ‘Farewell Lips’ (also the film’s Japanese title) to illustrate HaruLeo’s opinions on their squandered possibility for romance. When it comes to Haru’s sorrow, words like “My temperature was rising, and I suppose you could tell” aren’t exactly subtle. “I’m ok with this thorn remaining trapped within me because it’ll always remind me of you,” and “I’m fine with this thorn staying stuck inside me because it’ll always remind me of you.”
Shiota uses flashbacks to explain more of Haru and Leo’s difficult relationship between each rendition of the song, with ‘Farewell Lips’ even appearing in a reminiscence of HaruLeo’s commencement. When it comes time to say goodbye to HaruLeo at their last gig, Shiota’s customary lack of fanfare, rather than the celebration or sorrow one would anticipate, is shown in their final performance of ‘Farewell Lips.’
.
Farewell Song, on the other hand, seeks solace in the familiar. At first, the conclusion seems to be a betrayal of the finality on which the story’s concept is based (to the point that it is jokingly acknowledged in-film). However, when one analyzes the film’s continuous pace from site to venue, HaruLeo’s commitment to continuing the tour, and positive songs about endurance (especially in ‘Tachimachi Arashi’), it becomes evident that it is their time together in the present – not the end – that counts most. It’s unclear what this implies for HaruLeo, but their carefree demeanor and joyous singing in tandem imply they’re prepared to put up with anything in order to be together.
Despite following quite distinct narrative and tonal courses, Harmful Insect and Farewell Song both arrive to the same conclusion: life continues on, for better or worse. Whether optimistically or oppressively, the adolescents in Shiota’s films are unable to escape life’s unpredictability. All that is left is to accept the known and unknown and go on.
