No Sense

At the high point of our intimacy, we were just 0.01cm from each other. I knew nothing about her. Six hours later, she fell in love with another man.

“Always believe in yourself. Do this and no matter where you are, you will have nothing to fear.”—Hayao Miyazaki 

Yeah, it’s like they’ve got this feeling, and they don’t have any skill, and they don’t want skill, because it’s really interesting what happens when your passion is bigger than the tools you have to deal with it. It creates this energy that’s raw. Isn’t it great?

“Until I came here, I had a certain confidence about my own life. That in my own way, I was happy. But looking back like this,I feel like something’s missing…

A so-so education, a so-so job, a so-so marriage, and a so-so retirement. Everything’s so-so, just so-so”

Koreeda Hirokazu interviewed by Tony Rayns on After Life (1998)

When Mochizuki agrees to identify a memory of his own, it seems that the colleagues who are filming him are part of his memory. Is that so? And if so, what does that imply about the process?

That’s exactly the core of the film, but it’s the first time I’ve been asked that question! Yes, it’s true: Mochizuki’s memory includes not only the 20 years he was alive but also the 50 years of service in limbo. His ‘memory’ is an acceptance and affirmation of the time spent in the way-station as well.

I actually had very ambitious plans for that particular sequence. Given the film’s governing metaphors, I saw Mochizuki’s image of himself - the memory he chooses to have filmed - as being equivalent to documentary and the image of the crew filming him as being equivalent to fiction. That’s pretty much the way I think real memory works: a combination of fact and fiction.

I wish I could tell you how lonely I am. How cold and harsh it is here. Everywhere there is conflict and unkindness. I think God has forsaken this place. I believe I have seen hell. And it’s white… it’s snow-white.

L'Avventura-Michelangelo Antonioni (1959)

Cosmopolis (2012)