In November, Hatsuyuki decided to watch a movie, and only thought of one, "Love Letters" by Japanese director Shunji Iwai.
It was a movie released in 1995, but it wasn't until now, 26 years later, that I watched it in its entirety for the first time. During this time, I only heard about the film again and again from many celebrities and bloggers who followed, and only knew that the scene of a woman on her back on that beautiful snowy day came from this movie called "Love Letters".
Other than that, I don't know anything about this movie. I also don't like to consult the synopsis of the movie in advance before watching the movie in its entirety, and I certainly don't read any reviews – I just want to make sure that I can feel it for the first time without knowing the plot.
So, if you haven't seen the movie "Love Letters" in its entirety, then this article can be seen here without watching. Wait until you've seen the movie and come back to make up your homework.
How do I express my feelings about Love Letters?
I think that's one word: beauty.
I can declare without blushing that "Love Letters" is one of the most beautiful movies I have ever seen. The scene picture is beautiful, the male and female protagonists are beautiful, the background music is beautiful... In short, after watching this movie, you know what is called "beauty".
It is said that "Love Letters" was filmed in Hokkaido, Japan, where the climate is similar to that of northeast China, and the winter is long and snowy, so the "Love Letter" appears in perhaps the most beautiful late autumn and winter. Just right for viewing at this time.
The male and female protagonists, I must admit, are very handsome and beautiful. After reading "Love Letters", I feel that the status of Jeon Ji-hyun and Ha Ji-won as goddesses in my mind is no longer guaranteed, because Nakajima Miho's beauty is too powerful. Miho Nakajima in the film one person played two roles, not even changing the hairstyle, can actually deduce two completely different temperaments, who doesn't like it?
I confess that the reason why I was able to watch this movie was because I was led by the beauty of Miho Nakajima.
Because, in terms of plot logic, by the standards of 26 years later, I can only say that this movie is more like a prose poem than as exciting as the original novel. In the first half of the movie, you may not understand what this is doing, but in the second half, you can predict what will happen next.
So, don't expect to see what ups and downs of the story you want to see in "Love Letters", see the logical coolness of the mysterious flip, and don't even expect to get any soul inspiration about love from "Love Letters".
Hollywood's set of film logic that pursues excitement and coolness does not work here in the Japanese movie "Love Letters". Hollywood is not the only kind of movie in the world.
So what to see?
Just think of "Love Letters" as a prose poem. To appreciate the rhythm and beauty of each frame is enough to make you race the gods.
Only in this way can you feel the beauty and incomparable beauty of "Love Letters".
You can feel that the biggest scale of this whole story is just a kissing movie, calm as water, but it can still hit your heart deeply for some moments, so that after you have seen it, you can't wake up from its atmospheric momentum for a long time.
Probably this is the shock of beauty.
It is necessary to talk about the emotional line in the play. Only to answer one question, the male protagonist Fujii Tree in middle school obviously liked the female tree, and later moved away in the university with the appearance and female tree very similar to Hiroko Watanabe fell in love, and even close to the engagement, the male protagonist is a scumbag who likes the new and the old, is the male protagonist a substitute for Hiroko as a substitute for first love?
Perhaps, this is the only emotional problem left by the movie "Love Letter" to the audience.
My own opinion is that the male protagonist is not a scumbag, nor does he use Hiroko as a substitute for his first love.
People seem to have forgotten the timeline, when they were in junior high school, the male protagonist really liked the female tree, and the name of the female tree was written over and over again in the library card, and the appearance of the female tree was secretly painted. But it's all just junior high school. Later, the male protagonist transferred schools, and since then they have never seen each other again, and they have not heard from them. The picture of the library card at the end of the movie is just the unspoken love that has been hidden in the river of years for a long time. This love came through time and finally appeared in front of the female tree again, but it could not be changed, it was just a distant feeling of nearly ten years ago, and that love only existed in the distant junior high school.
There is no doubt that the female tree with the same name and surname is the first love of the male protagonist Fujii Shu, and also the girl who left the initial emotional impression on the male protagonist. From then on, the girl that the male protagonist likes will inevitably have the appearance of first love. It's just that there are too many similarities in the girlfriend of college, Hiroko Watanabe.
But the original book and the movie actually give us the answer - because the personalities and temperaments of Ogyu and Hiroko Watanabe, which are played by Miho Nakajima, are so different. The female tree is spontaneous and nervous, so dull in emotional matters, the whole world knows that Fujii tree likes her only she thinks it is a prank; and Watanabe Hiroko, is such a sensitive and delicate person, but so determined about feelings. With two very different personalities, why do the audience think that the male protagonist Fujii Tree can't feel it?
But in the story, the male protagonist Fujii Tree still walked hand in hand with his college girlfriend Hiroko Watanabe, and even went to the nearest engagement, until the male protagonist was accidentally killed. This is the love affair between the male protagonist and Hiroko, a more mature love that is different from the first love.
Therefore, I am quite disgusted by the film seeing the end, the bullet screen brushed up with a variety of "he spent a lifetime in love with you" misreading.
Is "Love Letters" expressing anything?
Then I think, maybe it is just expressing, feelings like water years, missed, and passed away. Old lovers will no longer be lovers. Just as the leaves fall every autumn, new snow falls every winter.
But sometimes, when the secrets hidden in the past years that you did not know and did not open your mouth appeared in front of you again after years, how would you face it?
With a smile, or with tears?
And this is the meaning of "Love Letters".