The late Nobuhiko Obayashi always had a knack for experimenting in his films, with the mashup of genres being one of his trademarks. Both these elements find one of their apogees in “Emotion”, a 36-minute short that seems to have included every trick in the cinematic book of the time.
“Emotion” screened at the Hong Kong Arts Centre, as part of the Obayashi Nobuhiko Film Show Case
The main story, if one can call it that, focuses on a young girl Emi, who travels from her seaside town to the city, where she meets a girl that eventually becomes her best friend, Sari. A bit after that, however, she falls in love with a man who seems to be a vampire, with the relationship of the two girls taking a direct hit. Her romance with the mysterious man, however, is not exactly paved in roses.
Obayashi, who also shot and edited the film, presents a title that becomes obvious from the beginning, that it will be a delirious one. The frantic editing, the text on blacks screens as in silent movies, the narration, sometimes in English, sometimes in Japanese, are all there from the first scenes, and the situation just gets worse (or better if you prefer) as time passes. The move to the city and the jumping-around-in-the-parks relationship of the two girls is interrupted by the presence of the mysterious man, with Obayashi adding even more “tricks” playing with film speed, including illustrations that look like they jumped out of a De Sade’s book, animation, and some brief splashes of color in the overall black-and-white film.
This absurd amalgam however, does not stop at the cinematic techniques, but extends to the genres Obayashi seems to mock here. In that fashion, the romance is combined with a western and a vampire story, while on some level, one can also find elements of a family drama. If that was not enough, he also breaks the fourth wall a number of times, with the gun shooting scene also involving the people who actually shot it. Lastly, a number of iconoclastic elements can also be found after a point, with the blood on the statues being the most memorable sample, while a sense of humor also comes to the fore on occasion, particularly in the ways he constructs and deconstructs the story.
It is quite difficult to find a purpose in all this chaos, as Obayashi mostly seems to play with everyone, including his cast and crew, his audience, and essentially, with cinema itself. At the same time however, his ability at composition is more than evident on a number of scenes, while this whole playfulness, results in a rather entertaining movie, particularly for those viewers that do not mind absurdity and chaos in their movies.
