Takeshi Kitano is a well-known Japanese director and successor to Akira Kurosawa's films in Japan. Before his death, Kurosawa wrote a letter to Takeshi Kitano, in which he wrote: Kitano, without you, the future of Japanese cinema would be chaotic. This shows Kurosawa's affirmation of Kitano Takeshi. Takeshi Kitano's films are often full of violent elements and are known for their violent aesthetics, but this bohemian director actually makes some delicate and warm films, such as Takeshi Kitano's self-directed "Kikujiro's Summer", which is one of the few warm films he has made.
The film tells the story of Masao, a third-grade student who has been living with his grandmother because his father has long since died, and learns from his grandmother that his mother is working in another place. Summer vacation arrives, and the bored Masao discovers his mother's address from a letter sent to his grandmother, and he decides to go to her alone. When the neighbor's aunt learned about it, she decided to assign this task to her idle husband and ask him to take masamune to see his mother. However, the process of this unreliable man taking masao all the way to find his mother is very tortuous, and it is difficult to find masamune's mother, but he finds that she already has a new family. In order to make the lost masao happy, the uncle tried everything. Finally, at the end of the summer, Masao had a smile on his face.
Many people define "Kikujiro's Summer" as a "comedy" movie, and it is true that there are many laughs in the movie, but many people may be more silent, emotional and even want to cry after laughing. In fact, this is not a comedy movie, this summer, this uncle accompanied the little boy's path to find his mother, in fact, out of three processes: the growth of the man, the uncle's new understanding of life, and director Kitano Takeshi and his father's reconciliation.
Masao, a ten-year-old boy in the third grade of primary school, a child whose father died since childhood, and whose mother was not around, imagine such a child, in his childhood world, naturally there will not be much joy. When you see other peers with their parents, children like Masao will definitely have a lot of heartache in their hearts. Therefore, the man in the movie always walks with his head bowed, a melancholy and hollow look in his eyes, and the little age seems to have no joy.
So that summer, Masao decided to go to his mother. Accompanying Masao on the road is the unreliable uncle Kikujiro. It was an exciting journey to find a mother, but the road was not smooth. Masao is almost sexually harassed by perverts, Masao and Kikujiro repeatedly fail to hitchhike, and they can only sleep outside at night, and when they are evil, they can only eat things stolen from the ground. For the young man, this is undoubtedly a process that makes this teenager understand the dangers of society and the hardships of life in advance. But difficulty and sadness are not the whole of life, although sometimes its shadow seems impossible to hide. On the way that Uncle Kikujiro accompanies Masao, they also meet well-meaning people who help them: the couple who gives angel school bags to Masao, the wandering poet who lets them hitchhike, the "Biker Party" who accompanies Masao to play games, and Kikujiro who protects Masao along the way and makes Masao happy.
In the complex real world, there are good people and bad people, good and evil, although it is not perfect, but this is the nature of the world. For the young man, this summer, this journey to understand the world early, may not be a bad thing. Masao finally walks out of the loss of unsuccessfully searching for his mother, and the taciturn and empty-eyed Masao becomes a lively, smiling man. At the end of the movie, Masao finally stops having nightmares, but has a funny, warm dream. In fact, this also represents a change in the mentality of the right man. Step out of the closed self of the past and move towards a richer life in the future.
Kikujiro, the uncle who accompanies Masao to find his mother. The director's setting for this character is: people do nothing in middle age, idle like a leper, uneducated, unreliable, love to gamble, and always have a bad mouth. In short, such a setting makes kikujiro's role completely unpretentious. If there is no journey to accompany Masao to find his mother, then kikujiro, the uncle, will probably continue in the second half of his life as before. However, it is precisely because of this summer journey to accompany Masao's mother-seeking that Kikujiro's personal growth is completed, and it is also his self-redemption.
Halfway through the movie, it's when uncle Kikujiro accompanies Masao to his mother's house. However, just as Masao sees his mother having a new family, Hisaishi makes sad music follow. At that moment, the uncle suddenly understood that the original masao, like himself, was also a child abandoned by his mother, because when he was young, his mother also abandoned him and chose to remarry.
In order to make the lost masao happy, the uncle snatched the angel bell from the "flying car party" to give it to the man; took the man to the night market, played balloons, fished for goldfish, because he was taught a lesson by the underworld because of his unruliness, he could only trick the man's injury from falling down the stairs to get it, and the man ran to the pharmacy to buy medicine to wipe the uncle's blood and apply medicine; later along the way, he met the fat man and bald head of the "flying car party", as well as the wandering poet, who made the game together to make the man happy.
In fact, the process of accompanying Masao and playing games with Masao is actually a childhood trip by Uncle Kikujiro. Kikujiro, who is similar to Masao's life, may not have experienced such a childlike childlike fun in his childhood, and while making Masao happy, he also slowly made up for the lack of childhood.
This summer, this journey of finding his mother with Masao is actually a return to childhood for his middle-aged uncle Kikujiro. Because of this, uncle Kikujiro also slowly opened his heart knot, he went to the nursing home to visit the mother who abandoned himself three times since childhood, although he had never had a conversation with his mother, but he had a wish.
Perhaps Kikujiro also complained about his mother, but in this summer, he was redeemed in his heart.
Takeshi Kitano's father was named Kikujiro. The prototype of the protagonist Kikujiro in "Kikujiro's Summer" is actually Takeshi Kitano's father. His father was a painter, a gambler, a frequent alcoholic, and when he was drunk, he abused his mother. Father was also a cowardly and incompetent, bullying and afraid of hard. He caused a lot of harm to his family, and he always said dirty words in his mouth, calling people "bastards" was his mantra. These are recorded in Takeshi Kitano's autobiography, The Tavern of Takeshi Kitano.
However, Kitano Takeshi was also subtly influenced by his father, such as liking violence, smoking, drinking, and fighting, which Kitano Takeshi has done. His films are also often full of violence, such as "Hanabi" with a Douban score of 8.6 and "Bad Boy's Sky" with a Douban score of 8.5.
Kitano May not necessarily hate that he has lived like a father, and he has lived a look that he hates. In fact, Kitano Takeshi has been trying not to follow in his father's footsteps and try to reconcile with his father. This "Kikujiro's Summer" is, in a sense, a reconciliation between Takeshi Kitano and his father. The father who had been a mediocre all his life, who had hurt him and brought him negative effects, had not never warmed his life, at least, his father had taken him to see the sea. Later, the sea often appeared in Takeshi Kitano's films. Just like Kikujiro in the movie, despite the waste of firewood, he will also tell Masao that there are angels, and he will also play various roles to make Masao happy.
Takeshi Kitano when he was young
The influence of the original family on a person's personality is sometimes deep in the marrow, and it is not too much to describe it as "when I grow up, I will become you". Some people grow up trying their best to correct the negative effects of their parents, but after trying their best, they find that those influences have long been a part of their lives, as if stuck to the depths of their souls.
Kitano Takeshi did not break away from his father's influence, he was as violent and debauched as his father, but he did not live as a father in the end. Takeshi Kitano says he was born like a bird trapped in a cage, but he doesn't want to live a boring and boring life of being bound. In fact, he did it, he was admitted to Meiji University, and he became a good director, expressing his views on life and life in the film, expressing his true thoughts in his heart. In addition, Kitano also likes to draw, which is his interest in passing the time after a car accident. Sometimes inspiration comes, and a certain image suddenly appears in his mind, and he will get up in the middle of the night to paint. Although Takeshi Kitano himself does not feel that his paintings have any significance, we can see from them that there seems to be a childlike heart in this maverick man who seems to be incompatible with it.
Jung once said that everyone spends their whole life trying to integrate their own personalities since childhood. We can't say that Takeshi Kitano has completely stepped out of his father's shadow, but he has done his best on this issue all his life. Ten thousand steps back, at least, he forgave his father's misery, forgave his father for the harm he had done to him. "Kikujiro's Summer" is the reconciliation between Takeshi Kitano and his father. That summer, the growth of that little boy was also the growth of Kitano Takeshi himself, the long road that had been in the summer, and the reconciliation between Kitano Takeshi and his father Kikujiro.
At the end of the movie, Masao finally walks out of the loss of being abandoned by his mother, and finally has a smile on his gloomy face. Along the way, they bid farewell to the couple who let them hitchhike, dance mechanically, and give the male angel a small school bag, said goodbye to the fat boy and bald head who played the octopus and alien, and said goodbye to the wandering poet. Finally, Masao smiled and said goodbye to Kikujiro. People's life is actually a process of constant farewell, no one can accompany you to the end, but if you can remember those who have given you warmth, it is enough to take this touch on the road.
With Hisaishi's piano song "Summer", Kikujiro's Summer slowly came to an end. Takeshi Kitano said: "When we feel that our parents are not easy, we are really mature." This summer, this kikujiro accompanied Masao on his path of finding his mother, which not only allowed Masao to grow, but also allowed Kikujiro to find his lost innocence, and also allowed the director of this movie, Kitano Takeshi, to reconcile with his father, and even more so with Kitano Takeshi and himself.