A sole purpose of a film is to entertain, tell a story maybe deliver a specific message which may get people talking, debating possibly trigger some form of action. Most filmmakers will deliver that entertaining story but as soon as you leave that cinema or if it's a DVD switch off your player that 2 hours of pure escapism has been forgotten and you tread back into the real world.There are a few filmmakers out there who possess a natural talent of implanting the fabric of the film into your memory encouraging to share, debate maybe even take action and one of those is Japanese director Sion Sono. From the 2001 cult classic Suicide Club to the more recent Coldfish (2010) and now Himizu a tale of surviving but not just in the physical sense but at a natural level too.
Sumida's father penniless but most of absent from his parental duties appear in his son's life but treat him more as a punching bag for his angst and Sumida's dreams of an ordinary life start to evaporate in front of him. Keiko, however, is one of his schoolmates whose own dreams are fading in front of her she also has a major crush on Sumida and her presence around him seems to annoy him. Any good gestures that come Sumida's way he seems to reject them outright and any chances of leading that 'ordinary life' goes out the window when tragedy overtakes when he commits a crime bring him to the edge of insanity as dreams of apocalypse haunt him.
What really makes Himizu a really unsettling film, the 2 most important people in a child's life the parents are hateful, negligent instead of protecting their child from the horrors of everyday life. Sumida's father is a penniless alcoholic who takes out the angst of life out on his son treating him like a punchbag wishing he was dead. His mother is no better as she spends most time sleeping around, drinking leaving Sumida to fend for himself before leaving him for good by leaving him with her latest boyfriend. It asks the question was Sumida's father just another one of his mothers' boyfriends or were they the perfect couple whose life changed when their son was born? Whatever one it is he's that little accident they regretted.
The vagabond life they lead does in a way reflect the struggles many families live around the world face every day thanks to the world's economic crisis.The young can't get work thanks to the mistakes made by those they trusted to give them a good start in life so though the refugees may show there happy they feel dishonoured at those mistakes and will do anything to appease those mistakes.One of the older characters hooks up with a local pickpocket resulting in killing a nuke-loving nazi. He did it to help Sumida get the money for Yakuza for the gambling debts his father made and when he finds out the refugee is so ashamed. The streets do also seem to be full of knife yielding angry young men terrorising all who walk the streets, the anger, the disillusionment the disconnection from society is a feeling that's felt with the young worldwide.
Sion Sono is the master Nihilist and Himizu is probably his least nihilistic to date. The film is violent but violence with a purpose with a big slice of black comedy but not in a way it spoils the films.Himizu might not be the total package, I had to watch the film twice to really appreciate the ingenious work Sono has created, well-crafted work proves he is the master at the destruction of the human soul to the brink of insanity. What we mustn't forget is for life to get better sometimes it has to scrape the bottom of the barrel before it must get better and never give hope.
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