Miss Chihiro, the girl who came out of the haze of the custom shop

South Wind Window Contributing Author | Jiang Wen

Chihiro, who used to be a Japanese custom shop, now works at a bento shop by the sea – this short introduction alone is enough to make one wonder: what did Chihiro experience in two very different work scenarios, from custom shop to bento shop?

In the movie "Miss Chihiro", released at the end of February this year, Chihiro, a "former sex worker" played by Jun Muraka, works alone in a bento shop by the sea.

She never shies away from revealing her former occupation, calmly gets along with the residents of the town - homeless people, female high school students, children of single-parent families, "smelly men" who are not bad, Chihiro is surrounded by all kinds of people, she can always bring comfort to others, but like a duckweed does not have a deep connection with others.

Jun Arimura plays Chihiro

She is lonely, and she reflects the loneliness of others. Loneliness has long been a "national disease" faced by Japanese society, but Chihiro has proposed another interpretation of this loneliness.

It's like the line in the movie that points to people's hearts: everyone says that people are the same, but the truth is that we come from different planets, no wonder we can't understand each other, family, lovers, friends, no matter what the relationship, are the same.

Some people think that the director of "Miss Chihiro", Riya Imaizumi, is quite in Kore-eda's style, and the story is ultimately oriented to the same as the latter's "Thief Family", which won the Palme d'Or, and the lonely narrative outlines and interprets the wandering of the soul where to be at home and where to end, and the comfort from others. Even if the other has nothing to do with himself.

Director Riya Imaizumi

We struggle to find a deep connection between people, hurt by love, hurt by expectation, and disappointed by unattainable. But if we are all from different planets, since it is difficult to reach each other, then it is much easier to look at each other gently?

Look at the story of Miss Chihiro, she has an unusual past, in fact, she is the most ordinary girl, but she has more pain and loneliness in her body and heart than ordinary people, but she comes out and gets along with people, and she still radiates the warmth of humanity everywhere.

01

"There are no rabbits on the moon"

At the beginning of the movie, Chihiro meets a street cat and sits on the ground chatting with it, beautiful, ordinary, and bright. She then walked to the edge of the harbor, where the sea and sky met, fishing boats came and went, the breeze blew through, her hair was like clouds, and the day's work began.

Chihiro interacts with Street Cat

Inside the bento shop, Chihiro jokes with the town uncle, and the fresh image of the opening scene seems to conflict but natural.

"Uncle Mao is eating such a supplement today, what do you want to do?"

"Of course, I want to satisfy you well tonight."

Chihiro smiled heartily, "Give you two packs of soy sauce, I wish you an early death and an early life for this color uncle." ”

In the kitchen behind, the wife and clerk muttered: "It's worthy of being a young lady, and there is really a set of dealing with male guests." Chihiro grinned, "Thanks for the compliment."

The store manager cares about Chihiro, how can this kind of thing be said casually. 

Chihiro is light, everyone has long known - her identity is not revealed by others, but self-admitted.

For Chihiro, the profession of "sex worker" is as sparse and ordinary as "bento shop clerk", and she does not care about the eyes of others.

Why can Chihiro view this profession, which is unsavory and full of moral flaws in the eyes of ordinary people, so commonplace?

Subsequently, the film reveals to the audience the bits and pieces of Chihiro's past life in a trivial and soothing rhythm, not curious, and there is no shock, and the director explains this "strange" woman and loneliness from the daily texture.

We always say that man is a collective animal, but with the process of modernization, man began to become atomized, so there was "loneliness", which is an explanation of loneliness.

A still from "Miss Chihiro"

However, don't people feel lonely in a collective? In a society like Japan, where collectivity is emphasized, people are becoming more lonely, which shows that the "lonely line" between "collective" and "individual" is not so clear.

People feel lonely in any relationship. Nietzsche also shouted in the face of loneliness: "I expect someone, I look for someone, I always find myself, and I no longer expect myself!" Loneliness is an emotion, a society, and a philosophical proposition.

Chihiro is also a lonely person, and loneliness goes with her. Although the movie is not fully revealed, it can be seen that Chihiro's relationship with the family is not close. During these days at the bento shop, his younger brother calls to inform him of his mother's death, but Chihiro is reluctant to go to the funeral and goes to the grave alone after the funeral.

Chihiro sweeps the grave alone

In this regard, Chihiro calmly told Aunt Tae, the owner of the blind bento shop, "My mother passed away, and I don't feel anything at all. There was no sadness, no regret, no loneliness, not even tears. Although the movie does not explain the reason, it uses a "fantastical" encounter to let us touch Chihiro's original loneliness.

When Chihiro was a child, she saw a seaweed sushi roll that looked delicious in a picture book, so she tried to make it secretly, but it sold very well. She was sitting alone outside on the stone steps to eat, when a woman from the custom shop asked her for one and told her it was delicious. Chihiro was startled by the sound of the wind blowing the tree, and the woman told her, "Don't be afraid, the night is in the same country as us." ”

One big and one small, the two walked a short way together. The girl tried to touch the woman's hand several times before the woman noticed and took her hand. Under the bright moon, the girl asked her "is there a rabbit on the moon", and the woman did not weave fairy tales: "Of course not." ”

The girl feels the warmth of "Miss Chihiro"

Before parting, the girl gave the woman an acorn, and the woman also gave her a business card: "I am Chihiro, remember to look for me when you come to the store." The girl who grew up stepped into the custom shop with the name "Chihiro", and the woman who met Pingshui was the first person who made the girl feel "from the same planet".

The same smell of loneliness gave the girl a touch of relief. Ah, it turns out that you are also here.

02

Lonely to the Nth power

Even if she is lonely, Chihiro does not refuse to associate with others, and does not vainly try to find driftwood attachment. With a more detached attitude, she brings warmth to others without letting herself get too deeply bonded.

Utsumi, the owner of the custom shop, recalls the first time he saw Chihiro:

Looks out of place, like an ordinary, quiet little girl. When you look down, your shoes are dirty to death. "If she hadn't opened the door of my store that day, she wouldn't have been in this world."

"The personality is elusive, and it feels like her heart is empty, like a ghost."

Chihiro and the boss Utsumi

Working in a custom shop is also a journey for Chihiro to find herself. Sex is the instinctive need of humans as animals, and "sex" is both intimate, exclusive and even exclusive. We can explain sex, but "love" is difficult to explain, so "sex" seems to have another layer of mystery.

Chihiro is also comforting someone who is equally lonely. The man who hit his father with a baseball bat, he hates those who do whatever they want and bully the weak, he is emotional and angry, and he is lonely; The homeless man who was bullied by small children, Chihiro took him home and helped him bathe.

Chihiro believes that sex and love are two different things, and sex is like drinking water, which is a natural physiological phenomenon. "I can't monopolize someone's heart, and I don't want to be possessed. If it's love, I'd rather not, I can't be immersed in love. ”

In stark contrast to Chihiro is her former colleague Bajir, a woman with a bright appearance and a warm personality.

Bagil

In the movie, they happen to interpret two different attitudes towards love. Bagil wants to monopolize someone's heart, she will be heartbroken because she misses someone too much, she longs for the love that binds each other, she wants to have sex with the person she loves - intimate, exclusive, exclusive, this is Bagil's solution to loneliness.

Bajir fell in love with the former custom shop owner Utsumi, a man who was once deeply bound by marriage and responsibility, and also divorced after giving up opening a custom shop. Chihiro says that Atsumi is a man who likes her and trusts her, but does not covet her body - "Shop manager, you are like my father." Chihiro said.

And this is incomprehensible to Bajir, she thinks it is just a rhetoric or excuse, so she goes to Chihiro to confront him in a fit of anger.

"Can there only be a romantic relationship between a man and a woman?" Chihiro asked rhetorically.

"After all, at the end of the day, we're all just animals. Even if you think so, others don't necessarily think so. ”

Chihiro didn't explain, she said, "You really don't have a human eye. It turns out that the store manager is a dull man, and he has the "man's thirst for women" for Bagil.

Chihiro and Bajir's thoughts about love

In fact, what is discussed here is sex and love, marriage, love, men and women, but in essence, it is still the loneliness that people cannot understand each other and reach each other.

The marriage between the store manager and his ex-wife is bound to be lonely, and Bajir and the store manager cannot communicate each other's intentions at the beginning. Maybe Bagil and the store manager are from the same planet. As for Chihiro, she has long given up love, eating, drinking, and having sex are daily needs, and it is enough to be able to enjoy a happy life soberly. The red knife wound on her back seemed to have saved her the calamity of love.

So Chihiro, who is now leisurely and free, can also survive for others: the naughty boy Makoto, there is a young single mother, the boy hurts Chihiro with a round plan, but Chihiro gives him a delicious bento; Chie, the owner of the bento shop who is blind and hospitalized, Chihiro visits the hospital and secretly takes her out to "see" the rain; There is also the female high school student Buchi who was kicked out of her home.

Another female high school student, Oka Ji, is born in a seemingly "normal" family, but she is asked to be an "obedient girl" due to the authority of her father and the promise of her mother; And at school, she doesn't fit in with everyone else, but she has to pretend to fit in. Okaji said that her mother's food was delicious, but she couldn't eat it at home.

Okaharu was asked to be called an obedient girl

Gangji's pressure comes from the "ideal look" of parents and the collective. "I'm not good at dealing with that kind of person." Chihiro told Okaji. "Everyone says that food is to eat with others to be delicious, but sometimes eating with others is not necessarily delicious; Sometimes when you eat alone, the delicious things are still just as delicious. ”

"My mother's fried noodles are delicious." The boy next to him, Makoto, smiled contentedly.

Even if you come from a different planet, you will encounter it one day. "Like Okaharu and Makoto." Chihiro said to Okaji with a smile.

So far, even if the movie does not explicitly say, we can see from all kinds of clues that Chihiro has also experienced the suppression from the original family, the injury from the lover, and the lock from the collective to the individual. After experiencing rupture and wandering, after experiencing loneliness enough to die, this soul becomes warm and free.

03

Different interpretations of "family"

What is the price of freedom?

The answer is still loneliness.

This seems to return to the origin of the problem, because Chihiro was also lonely as a child, and she is still lonely now. However, people will grow differently after different experiences, so the appearance of loneliness will also become different.

When Chihiro felt weak, she lay alone in bed and did nothing. She said she had sunk to the bottom of the sea. But people's bodies will eventually float, whether dead or alive, as long as they don't struggle. Ah, I'm still breathing, it's good to be able to keep walking.

Chihiro uses the goldfish metaphor to describe loneliness

It is undeniable that the original family is something that a person has to face from the very beginning, and if a person is lonely at the beginning, there is a high probability that he will carry the "loneliness gene".

Behind the loneliness, one of the big propositions discussed in "Miss Chihiro" is "family affection".

Female high school students Okaji and Chibu, boy Makoto, and the man who left home after hitting his father with a baseball bat are all burdened with "injuries" from their original families; The store manager Utsumi represents "affection in marriage".

Aunt Tahui is a mother who has become estranged from her raised daughter; Chihiro leaves her native family by escaping; And the homeless man who died alone, and he didn't even have anyone to greet.

Here we should ask: Is there no family love in an imperfect family? The answer is not as simple as "yes" or "no". At this point, we can ask another question: Is there a different interpretation of family love?

Bloodline is not the only interpretation of "family". Even loved ones can't really understand each other, and in the vast sea of people, it is so difficult to find someone from the same planet as yourself. Okaharu couldn't help but cry after eating the "super delicious yakisoba" made by Makoto's mother, maybe this is a unique "hometown taste" from "the same planet", and the rice is delicious when eaten with the right person.

At the end of the film, the group of people around Chihiro gathered together on the rooftop barbecue, chatting and laughing, as if forming a temporary "family". Similar to this, is Hirokazu Kore-eda's "Thief Family", where several marginal characters mistakenly form a decent "home" - director Hirokazu Kore-eda is also asking: How is the family formed?

It is Hirokazu Kore-eda's work "Thief Family"

But Chihiro chose to leave secretly at this time, and Aunt Tae called, "A lonely aura suddenly disappeared, and it was hard not to notice it." Ask you, do you want to go far, far away? It's time to stop. You don't need to go anywhere anymore. You are a person, no matter where you go, you can't let go of the loneliness in your heart. See you tomorrow. ”

Chihiro choked, "See you tomorrow." Jun Yumura's smiling eyes seemed to be about to shed tears. Aunt Dohui is the second person she meets who is from the same planet as her. When Chihiro secretly took Tae to "see" the rain, there was such a heart-pounding conversation like heavy rain, making the two look like relatives, friends, and lovers.

"It felt like an affair." Tae said.

"Or is it more like elopement?"

"It's not so much elopement as martyrdom."

Martyrdom is the ultimate (and extreme) bond between people who are lonely to death.

Chihiro reconciles with herself

But Chihiro eventually embarked on a new journey, and when asked what she did before, she smiled in the sun and said, "I'm just a bento shop clerk." In contrast to the previous "I am a sex worker", Chihiro once again reconciled with himself.

Perhaps it does not matter whether there is the so-called worldly "happiness" or not, just walk with the heart, even the body is open, and the soul at this time is the most comfortable - open, quiet, free and warm. This is the comfort and solution that Miss Chihiro has given us.

The pictures in the article come from the Internet

Edit | Wu Qing

New Media Editor|Orb

Typesetting | Zheng Zewei

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