"Little Forest": Sometimes the rural life that longs for is often behind the escape
In our country, I believe that the name "Li Ziqi" is almost a household name.
On average, nine out of ten netizens know about this "internet celebrity" and "video blogger" who lives in the idyllic life of Shanshui.
She has a lot of stories that everyone talks about. The more famous video bloggers who earn tens of millions of dollars a year and promote traditional Chinese culture seem to have such ideas after watching her videos.
"Can I make money by making a video like Li Ziqi?"
According to incomplete statistics, in the past two years when short videos have developed, video websites such as Douyin, B station, and watermelon video have welcomed many bloggers with rural themes as shooting themes.
Catching fish in the river, farming and cutting vegetables, rural food, etc. have become the favorite things for many urban people.
As far as the Douyin platform is concerned, there are rural food bloggers with tens of thousands of fans who have been born.
It seems that today, the poor countryside that people used to think of has become a fragrant feast in the eyes of many people.
And today we want to talk about a country life, food theme movie: "Little Forest".
Specifically, this movie can be divided into two parts: "Little Forest Summer and Autumn" and "Little Forest Winter and Spring".
Let's first take a look at the poster and some of the scenes for this movie:
I believe that many people have only one feeling in their hearts when they watch this movie:
wow! Nice clean countryside! What a beautiful natural environment!
The heroine Ichiko is an ordinary girl who grew up in Komori, a village in the Tohoku region of Japan. This is a village far away from the hustle and bustle of the city, surrounded by green mountains and rivers, and a paradise.
Living in a country where there are not many convenient facilities, Ichiko relies on the memories of her childhood and her mother's life to concoct a variety of delicacies for herself.
There is not much dialogue in the whole movie, and there is only the inner monologue of the heroine alone and labor.
It's actually very logical, and when you live alone, you will find that sometimes talking is completely unnecessary.
As the movie says:
On days when you are so quiet that you can only hear breathing, you will understand that loneliness is the norm of life
Here I have to praise Ichiko's actor Ai Hashimoto, her appearance in the play is super good-looking, and there is a bit of classical beauty in the quiet.
Here are her other film stills:
This drama has three major points of interest:
One: Ingredients from nature make delicate and small food.
There are actually supermarkets near the countryside where the city lives, but she herself has to be self-sufficient because she does not have too many savings.
Ichiko lives in an old mansion, and she needs to farm, fish, grow her own vegetables, go up the mountain to pick wild vegetables, and participate in village activities.
The film as a whole gives people a soft and simple feeling, as always in the Japanese style. Watching the protagonist cook the ingredients each time, cook the food through various methods, and eat it bite by bite, the full sense of happiness and healing is like overflowing.
1. Natto glutinous rice balls
Natto is a traditional Japanese folk dish that feels sticky. Natto is featured in Japanese dramas and many anime.
The film also talks about the general method of natto: the softly boiled soybeans are wrapped in straw bags, and more straw is placed in it, in order to increase the viscosity of natto. Wrapped straw is buried in the snow for a while.
The reason why it becomes viscous should be the role of microorganisms.
This practice is not only associated with the practice of moldy tofu in our country.
Fermented natto should also be eaten with rice cakes, just think of the salty sweet, salty and sweet a little slimy natto, with a soybean fragrance, accompanied by soft sticky teeth of glutinous rice dumplings, look at the people's tongue!
2. Walnut rice
Japan is a country with four distinct seasons, and Komori's autumn is also golden. The ripe rice grains looked far away and covered the pale yellow earth with a golden carpet. Villagers who are busy harvesting in the field will also pick up some ripe wild walnuts to make sweet walnut rice.
After carefully removing the small shells, the walnuts are pounded with garlic mortar until they are mushy, and poured into the washed rice, and the ratio of walnuts to rice is about ten to two or three. Add an appropriate amount of wine and a small spoonful of soy sauce and simmer. After the walnut rice is ready, it can be directly kneaded into a rice ball and eaten.
Look at this appearance and eating, how can it not make people's appetite increase!
Two: the state of the countryside under the fast-paced modern life
Japan is a developed country, sparsely populated, and has a high per capita GDP, so the infrastructure is very perfect.
Like the hot toilet seat that sold well in China in the early years, this is very common in rural Japan.
In addition, basically every household has a car, trams run directly from the city, and convenience stores abound. Amazon's fulfillment is also convenient. Even rural schools have very high-end basketball halls, just like the high-end atmosphere in the dunk masters.
It can be said that you can enjoy it in the city and basically in the countryside. The difference is only that the scale may be a little smaller, but the functionality is perfect.
And it is worth mentioning that many well-known private restaurants in Japan like to open in the countryside.
Hours of operation are limited and only by appointment.
Komori in the movie is also like this. They harvest rice using harvesters and handheld machines, and the popularization of science in mechanical agriculture has penetrated rural life in Japan.
And after living in the big city for a long time, you will find that all the people around you are anxious, anxious for income, anxious for love, anxious for family, anxious for future life, but although people in Komori have relatively busy labor, you can see that their mental state is full.
After they are busy, they can organize the whole village to gather in the school, make food together, share food, and it is not fun.
In the real Japanese countryside, the aging of the population is an inevitable trend.
Bustling urban life attracts groups of young people, while the weaker elderly stay in the fresh air of the countryside.
However, Japan itself is a narrow region, with trains in all directions, and many people living in the city are very convenient to go to the countryside.
In the spring, the mountains are full of green, in the summer the lake is cool, in autumn it is golden, and in winter it is snowy.
Aren't these beautiful seasons the purest beauty in people's hearts?
Three: Isn't there an escape behind the beautiful pastoral life?
In the movie, Ichiko once went to Tokyo to explore, but she could not adapt to the fast pace of the city, and finally returned to the old house where her mother was long gone.
In the quiet but beautiful rural life, Ichiko must be self-reliant, using her childhood mother Fukuko to make randomly named delicacies using various ingredients in the mountains and rivers and fields, and the solid-eyed Ichiko sighs and is deceived, but also leaves good memories in the depths of the taste buds.
Ichiko used to be one of the most Japanese young people working hard in the city, but her heavy work career and poor relationships made her feel deeply tired under the stressful economic pressure.
Human beings often subconsciously avoid this situation when faced, and she begins to miss the beautiful childhood life and begins to miss the countryside surrounded by mountains and rivers.
This idea was when she made a very elaborate lunch for her handsome migrant worker, but was ridiculed, she finally understood one thing:
She was not suitable for the city, and she wanted to return to Komori.
Like Japan, the pace of our Chinese society today is also making many young people more and more unbearable.
High housing prices, month-to-month income differences, and the constant forced marriage and childbirth at home are like a tall wall.
Let people close and not breathe.
The appearance of Li Ziqi has brought countless Chinese the idyllic life familiar to childhood, and when people are relaxed, it is like a stabilizer.
There is no time to go back, and it is good to be able to see the countryside.
This is probably the thought of many people.
This movie is life, with a very strong Japanese film style. There is no deliberate sensationalism, no deliberate reasoning, but it does comfort the heart, everything is so natural.
Ichiko says she is escaping by returning to Komori.
There are many metaphors in the movie: the delay in building a tomato shed, because if it is really built, it means that it intends to live in Komori for a long time. It can be seen that Ichiko is unwilling in his heart.
When the snow is heavy, Ichiko likes to stand alone in the no-man's snow, quietly emptying his mind and merging with heaven and earth.
What was she thinking at this time? Nostalgic for city life in the past?
Changing the environment, changing the life, may be able to get a moment of peace, but the problem is still there. It will flash at some inadvertent time, reminding the city of those who are unwilling to face it.
Ichiko silently reminds herself that she is a deserter.
Ichiko chose to return to Komori in part because of her mother's departure, leaving her alone to face the world, and one person to bear everything.
At the end of the movie, Ichiko lives in Komori for a few years, and finally leaves resolutely with the encouragement and comfort of her mother's letter. In the past, I returned to Komori because I couldn't get a foothold in the city, and I felt that it was disrespectful to Komori. She was injured in the city and returned to Komori, the land of Komori, where the human feelings, the food gave her comfort and gave her strength. So she definitely packed her bags and went to the city again.
The snow falls without a trace, but people's hearts have marks.
People are always complaining about their lives and dissatisfaction, but no matter which way they go, they have chosen it.
Please don't say such stupid things about deserters, because whether you escape or face the wind and rain, this is a part of life.
Without words, it is a great gift to come to this world, to taste food and spirits, and to live happily.