Shintaro Tanaka is showing his new film at the Japan Filmfest in Hamburg. The director presents with “Memory” a thriller that generates from a very good idea. Unfortunately its execution is defective.
Memory is screening at Japan Filmfest Hamburg
Maezono (Yuya Maeji) has been homeless for several months. He doesn't remember why he got there, he doesn't even know who he is. One morning a young woman, Rina (Haruka Nagao), comes to him, saying that she is his sister-in-law. She tells him her sister and respectively his wife Aki (Kasumi Taguchi) is dead, she has been murdered. He has to go with her, to regain his memory, so that they can try to figure out who really killed her.
The two embark on a painful journey into the past. They find Aki's diary in which she tells how she met a charismatic guy, Suzuta (Hideto Suzuki), how she fell for him and how she got addicted to ecstasy thanks to him. It gets even worse, since Suzuta has a ring of prostitution. He forces Aki to have sex with men and in return, she gets the drugs she can't afford otherwise. In all this, Maezono plays the role of the trigger. When he lost his job, he began to drink too much and treated Aki badly.
It is in itself a good idea to use the memory loss of the protagonist to unveil bit by bit the crime story at the Centre of the film. Tanaka reveals in several flashbacks more and more about it. One twist follows the other. On a methodic point of view he we see a classical whodunit thriller with a considerable sense of suspense.
But the characters in this film are extremely superficial. There are no nuances. The men are the ones who do and decide things. The women are submissive. They can very easily be manipulated, actually they don't have an own will. In general, the film presents a very old-fashioned and quite annoying view on women. But despite that, the presentation of drug addiction, alcohol abuse, sexuality, corruption or financial distress is also problematic. There is not one thread of the story one can take particularly seriously.
The poor acting makes things even worse. It was surely difficult for the cast to relate to the plain dialogues. Still their gestures are overall exaggerated. This is evident for example in a very striking way in the recurrent headaches of Maezono who tries to gain back his memory. Same goes for Taguchi's interpretation of Aki, no matter if she is sad, blushes or is in her delirium.
The set design, the lighting, and the framing are, unfortunately, as amateurish as the rest of the movie. The handheld camera is too wild. Its form is meant to give a particular dynamic to the film but it is more form than really a narrative need.
Unfortunately “Memory” lacks of know-how on all levels. Moreover, it is too long and extra tiring. Like a Greek tragedy, the plot gets from scene to scene more and more dramatic – and in this case less credible.
