Name: Umi no chinmoku
Genre: Drama
Released: 2024-11-22
Duration: 1 h 58 min
Rating: 5.5
Cast: Masahiro Motoki, Kyôko Koizumi, Kiichi Nakai

"Whether famous or unknown, rich or poor, beauty is absolute."

At an art exhibition, one of the paintings turns out to be a forgery. Then bodies of people connected with the painting start turning up dead floating in the water.

I went into it expecting a serial-killer mystery. Sure, there is a mystery, a few clues, and a few people looking into it. But as it turns out, there isn't really a famous detective taking charge of the investigation. It is rather a case of various people discovering or revealing parts of the astonishing truth in stages. It is even unclear who is the protagonist, though eventually one can be said to exist.

Instead the story turns into a drama in an interesting change of genre. This could become a disappointment for anyone expecting an intellectually challenging mystery, but on the other hand a pleasant surprise for those who enjoy a depressing tragedy.

There is a strong impression that it is based on a thick novel, but no such novel seems to exist, and it seems to be an original movie written by Kuramoto Sou. Note that there is a French novel and movie with a similar title, but with a different plot, so it is hard to tell if there is a connection.

Obviously, art is a major theme, with some critique of fame, exhibitions, and auctions, while driving its own thesis about art. These discussions could be of interest for artists or collectors.

All the artists portrayed are old, and created most of their works in their youth, around 30 years earlier. Furthermore, the historical artists that are name-dropped, including Da Vinci, van Gogh, Degas and Monet all lived more than 100 years ago. Silently implying that art is a dead art.

The visual composition is good with some beautiful scenes, as can be expected from a movie about art. The acting is good from the many characters, and a couple of them even get into an interesting relationship that does not follow the usual pattern.

A mystery that turns into a drama rooted in events many years earlier is one of my favourite genres. Somehow this one does not create the greatest possible resonance.

Possibly it can be about pacing. In the first half, the momentum is good even though there is some confusion about who is the leading character. In the second half, the story is still interesting and the presentation is smooth, but the momentum and tension slows down a bit.

It obviously is well-made, but at first it was hard to tell who it is actually made for. It was only after learning about the respectable age of the writer that I realized that there might be a grain of self-reference in the story, and I started to feel more empathy with the characters, and possibly understood one more theme.

Japanese cinema is celebrated for its refined minimalist dramas and avant-garde experimentation; it also introduced popular genres like jidaigeki (samurai epics), kaiju, and anime. Across both high art and mass entertainment, it often explores morality, impermanence, and the pressures of modern life.

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The drama genre is a broad category that features stories portraying human experiences, emotions, conflicts, and relationships in a realistic and emotionally impactful way. Dramas delve into the complexities of human life, often exploring themes of love, loss, morality, societal issues, personal growth, with the aim to evoke an emotional response from the audience by presenting relatable and thought-provoking stories.

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