What would life be like if your every thought were audible for miles? Adapted from the manga by Makoto Sato, Katsuyuki Motohiro’s Transparent: Tribute to a Sad Genius (サトラレ, Satorare) considers how ironically isolating such a talent may turn out to be as the sufferer finds themselves withdrawing from others in embarrassment while wider society begins to resent being unable to tune out of their every inane thought or avoid being hurt by hearing something no one would ever say out loud even if they thought it privately.
The “Committee for the Preservation of the Specially Gifted” is dedicated to protecting the so-called “Transparents” whose thoughts are audible for a 10m radius though they have no control or even idea that it is happening. They’ve started an extensive public information campaign to reduce the stigma held against them because as they claim Transparents are a valuable natural resource mainly as they all have super high IQ and are at the forefront of technological advancement. Then again this extensive campaign seems like overkill as there are only currently seven confirmed Transparents on record, but in a minor twist the campaign is necessary because it’s essential that the Transparents never find out that their thoughts are public, the first apparently having taken their own life because of the intense embarrassment of trying to live without any kind of privacy.
This is the first ethical problem with the Transparent program which is curiously contradictory in its approach. The government could easily have said that Kenichi (Masanobu Ando), the sole survivor of a plane crash at three years old plucked from the wreckage when rescuers heard his internal monologue begging for help, had died and raised him in a lab, but instead they choose to return him to his grandmother in a designated Transparent town where they provide him with the illusion of a “normal” life while simultaneously micromanaging his existence. Their problem now is that he’s qualified as a doctor and wants to practice, but clinical medicine is obviously an occupation which requires discretion. Patients overhearing his “real” thoughts might not be helpful to their recovery, while he can hardly claim patient doctor confidentially when he’s likely to leak private medical details simply in the course of his work. Meanwhile, it tuns out that he’s already invented a revolutionary cure for athlete’s foot which is another reason why the council want to manipulate him into shifting towards research rather than clinical practice.
That’s why they’ve dispatched military psychologist Yoko (Kyoka Suzuki) who specialises in Transparents hoping that she can find a way to bend him to their will, but gradually she begins to come to a new understanding of what his life is like even while he has no idea everyone knows what he’s thinking. For example, no one wants to date a Transparent because they don’t want the intimate details of their love lives broadcast all over town, while the perfectly ordinary thoughts which should definitely stay in his head on catching sight of crush Megumi (Rina Uchiyama) can’t help but make her feel uncomfortable. The entire town is forced to pretend that they can’t hear him think, which seems somewhat unfair, leaving him at a disadvantage and more often at not at a loss as to why someone might seem hurt or upset by him when didn’t even say anything. Meanwhile, much of Yoko’s role lies in gently manipulating him, the entire committee decamping to a summer festival in a nearby town so they can let him down gently by leading him to believe Megumi already has a steady boyfriend who is kind to children and the elderly so he’s forced to be happy for her that’s she’s found such a great guy and can give up on his romantic aspirations.
The tone is in general admirably progressive in that it ultimately argues for a greater sense of acceptance for all minorities, but it’s difficult to square the positive message with the ways the Transparents are also being uncritically manipulated, forced to live a simulacrum of a life in an engineered small-town Japan which grateful to have them only for the massive subsidies they receive for local development in return for making sure the Transparents are kept in the dark about their condition so that the committee can exploit their genius as they plan to do with Kenichi after getting him to the research institution. Even so what they discover is that Kenichi knew what his genius was and only through letting him follow his dreams can they truly unlock it, while the committee is forced to reckon with the various ways they’ve dehumanised him, the chairman eventually referring to him as a person as opposed #7 as he’d always called him before. Somewhat contradictory and more than a little uncomfortable in its implications, Transparent: Tribute to a Sad Genius is presented as heartwarming drama and it does indeed warm the heart with this its messages of equality and acceptance not to mention the right to follow one’s dreams whatever they may be but never really reckons with its central thesis in which the authorities pat themselves on the back for being kind and doing the right thing while simultaneously exploiting those they claim to care for without their knowledge or consent.
The rate of social change in the second half of the twentieth century was extreme throughout much of the world, but given that Japan had only emerged from centuries of isolation a hundred years before it’s almost as if they were riding their own bullet train into the future. Norihiro Koizumi’s Flowers (フラワーズ) attempts to chart these momentous times through examining the lives of three generations of women, from 1936 to 2009, or through Showa to Heisei, as the choices and responsibilities open to each of them grow and change with new freedoms offered in the post-war world. Or, at least, up to a point.
Based on the contemporary manga by the legendary Fujiko F. Fujio (Doraemon), Future Memories: Last Christmas (未来の想い出 Last Christmas, Mirai no Omoide: Last Christmas) is neither quiet as science fiction or romantically focussed as the title suggests yet perhaps reflects the mood of its 1992 release in which a generation of young people most probably would also have liked to travel back in time ten years just like the film’s heroines. Another up to the minute effort from the prolific Yoshimitsu Morita, Future Memories: Last Christmas is among his most inconsequential works, displaying much less of his experimental tinkering or stylistic variations, but is, perhaps a guide its traumatic, post-bubble era.
Yoshimitsu Morita is an enigma. While directing some of the most acclaimed Japanese films of the 80s including 
Koki Mitani is one of the most bankable mainstream directors in Japan though his work has rarely travelled outside of his native land. Beginning his career in the theatre, Mitani is the master of modern comedic farce and has the rare talent of being able to ground often absurd scenarios in the humour that is very much a part of everyday life. Welcome Back, Mr. McDonald (ラヂオの時間, Radio no Jikan) is Mitani’s debut feature in the director’s chair though he previously adapted his own stage plays as screenplays for other directors. This time he sets his scene in the high pressure environment of the production booth of a live radio drama broadcast as the debut script of a shy competition winner is about to get torn to bits by egotistical actors and marred by technical hitches.
Article 39 of Japan’s Penal Code states that a person cannot be held responsible for a crime if they are found to be “insane” though a person who commits a crime during a period of “diminished responsibility” can be held accountable and will receive a reduced sentence. Yoshimitsu Morita’s 1999 courtroom drama/psychological thriller Keiho (39 刑法第三十九条, 39 Keiho Dai Sanjukyu Jo) puts this very aspect of the law on trial. During this period (and still in 2016) Japan does nominally have the death penalty (though rarely practiced) and it is only right in a fair and humane society that those people whom the state deems as incapable of understanding the law should receive its protection and, if necessary, assistance. However, the law itself is also open to abuse and as it’s largely left to the discretion of the psychologists and lawyers, the judgement of sane or insane might be a matter of interpretation.
If there’s one thing you can say about the work of Japan’s great comedy master Koki Mitani, it’s that he knows his cinema. Nowhere is the abundant love of classic cinema tropes more apparent than in 2008’s The Magic Hour (ザ・マジックアワー) which takes the form of an absurdist meta comedy mixing everything from American ‘20s gangster flicks to film noir and screwball comedy to create the ultimate homage to the golden age of the silver screen.
Windows on Worlds 