Hirobumi Watanabe: an unconventional portrayal of the everyday life | easternkicks.com (2024)

A showcase of the work from a director who says his life is a movie…

It’s not an easy thing to depict human existence, just as it is. Yet Japanese director Hirobumi Watanabe has been able to catch the chromatic nuances of everyday life, through his black and white cinema.

The 22^nd edition of Udine, Italy’s Far East Film Festival – online this year for the first time due to the global Covid-19 pandemic – dedicated an entire section to the discovery of the Watanabe universe, screening four of his films: Party ‘Round The Globe (2017), Life Finds a Way (2018), Cry (2019) and I’m Really Good (2020) during its June 26 to July 4 run.

Low budget productions from Foolish Piggies Films – co-founded with his brother Yūji in 2013 – that give us an intimate and unpretentious gaze into everyday life, Watanabe’s films can hardly fall into the mainstream categorisation of cinema genres. They area visual and acoustic experience, enriched by shots of Watanabe’s favourite clouds and the synergy he has with his brother, who hazards a fusion of classical musical, Japanese post-punk sound and noise to provoke a reaction from the human ear.

Inspired by the black humour of Imamura Shohei films like Pigs and Battleship (1961), Watanabe’s films constellate the everyday life with moments of pure comedy. As he argues: “I resonate with Charlie Chaplin’s ‘life is a tragedy when seen in close-up but a comedy in long-shot.’ I think it represents the existence of humankind.”

The comedy is enhanced by Watanabe’s self-fictionalization: having majored in literature at university, he was inspired by the Japanese shishōsetsu (literally “I-novel”, or confessional novel) genre, and literature intellectuals such as Natsume Sōseki, Kenzaburō Ōe and Osamu Dazai although Fellini’s 8 1/2 had a lot of impact as well. “I am a person who chose the path of making films and I keep living my existence in a way that if movies didn’t exist, I wouldn’t know what my tomorrow would be like,” he says. “If you can see my life in my movies is because my life is a movie. Of course, what you see in the movies is not 100 per cent me!”

The heart of Watanabe’s universe has a name and space: Ōtawara, a provincial city in the countryside of Tochigi prefecture that appears in all his films. “Ōtawara is a place very dear to me because it’s where I was born and grew up,” he says. “Shooting my films there is more convenient and cheaper, as I can have my family members and friends playing in my films. Being an independent film director is not easy when you have to sponsor yourself …”

However, being independent is an essential component of Watanabe’s anarchist spirit, reiterated in Life Finds A Way, a quasi-political manifesto against cinema conventions and mass homologation. In this film, Watanabe plays the role of a director – by chance called Watanabe Hirobumi – stuck in a creative block.

“People either love or hate my movies,” Watanabe explains. “There is no in-between. I did receive hateful letters like that after Life Finds a Way. I’m aware of the audience reaction but I honestly don’t care. If you make movies to win awards or to please the audience, you’ll lose the primary objective of filmmaking. Japanese contemporary cinema doesn’t give space to human values, but I want to make films looking at what happens in human life and society.”

Society is constantly present in Watanabe’s films, also through the TV news which plays a specific function in the narrative. He explains: “I got the inspiration from my grandmother, who passed away a year ago, aged 102 years old. She used to watch the news every day, at every moment and I just thought that it was very interesting and modern, the fact that such an old person knew about the details of the world.”

Cry is the exception, where news is deliberately shut down to focus on a rough sonority, anticipated by the title. With alienating long takes on grunting pigs, the film shows a typical week of a man who manages a pigsty. “I wanted to use nageki (grief) but then I chose sakebi (frustration), which was better expressing the sense of anger and sadness I felt,” says the director. “I went through a difficult time while we were shooting the film because my grandmother’s health was getting worst and she would soon pass away. Through the repetitiveness of the weekdays, I wanted to convey a sense of life cyclicity, despite the loss of someone. However, it’s up to the audience the interpretation of the nature of Cry.”

In contrast, I Am Really Good is a tender and intimate gaze at the world of children, into which adults rarely have the chance to step. The spontaneity and energy of the kids featured derive from Watanabe’s conscious choice in filmmaking. “Following Italian directors Rossellini, Visconti I want normal people acting in my films, not professional,” he says. “I prefer thinking of them as models rather than actors, as taught by Robert Bresson. I would just give the kids a situation and let them talk about whatever they like, letting them express themselves through long takes.”

With the continued global spread of the coronavirus, the direction of Watanabe’s future film making has not yet been defined.“The world has been changing dynamically,” Watanabe explains. “There are new standards, a different daily life and we film directors have to change our mentality as well. I received job offers as an actor, but regarding my movie, I have to think what to do. I still cannot see clearly the future, but I would like to shoot a movie in Italy … one day.”

Udine Far East Film Festival 2020 screened a special tribute to Hirobumi Watanabe, which ran from 26 June to 4 July. Love Finds A Way screens aspart of Chicago’s Asian Pop-Up Cinema – Season 11. Find out more on APUC’s website.

Linda Santu Lama is a member of the #FEFF22 Campus 2020. The campus is run each year, allowing young journalists from all over the world to cover the festival. You can find out more about the campushere.