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Cure, 1997
Kenichi Takabe (Koji Yakusho) is a detective investigating a series of murders with eerie similarities. Though the crimes are all committed by people they easily find and catch, none of them seems able to explain the reason for the killing, nor do they seem to have any connection with each other. That is until a common thread does emerge, an amnesiac young man named Mamiya (Masato Hagiwara) who came into contact with the perpetrators before they committed their crimes.
This is another rewatch for me, and a film I definitely enjoyed the second time around.
There is such a potent, unrelenting sense of unease in this film. The whole thing has a jaundiced color palette, as if the life has already been sucked out of everyone we meet. When there is a spot of brightness---such as the startling red of a dress at the dry cleaner's---it feels more like a warning than a relief from the muted tones. Then there is the way that the film is show, often at a distance from the characters. Close ups are used almost entirely to give us the perspective of a character in a certain moment.
The settings themselves feel unabashedly drawn from the vast well of horror imagery. Mental hospitals with long, dark hallways. Cells made of stone lit with yellow lights. Abandoned buildings where the wind howls through broken windows.
The mystery itself is intriguing. What power, exactly, does Mamiya have over the people he encounters? Through the film we see suggestions that this is a world brimming with anger, such as a man in a shop raving to himself. Is Mamiya simply tapping into some of that rage, or has he found a way to make people do something that is not actually in their hearts? In a later scene,
.
Hagiwara's performance as Mamiya is enjoyably frustrating. Perpetually evasive, one is never sure if he is playing a game or sincere. Does he understand the effect he has on others? Is his memory loss genuine? Or is it all an act? Either way, it is horrifying.
The first time I watched this film, I really struggled to pay attention to it. Or maybe that's not quite the right way to put it, but I didn't feel like I was in tune with its rhythms. I'd find that I'd spaced out on some dialogue or didn't quite get who a certain character was. It was the same thing this time around, but I think that it's just how I interact with the way the film is shot and edited, which has a kind of dreamy, unanchored feeling to it.
Great stuff, and even knowing how all the twists and turns would pan out I still really loved watching it all play out. Fantastic ending as well.
Cure, 1997
Kenichi Takabe (Koji Yakusho) is a detective investigating a series of murders with eerie similarities. Though the crimes are all committed by people they easily find and catch, none of them seems able to explain the reason for the killing, nor do they seem to have any connection with each other. That is until a common thread does emerge, an amnesiac young man named Mamiya (Masato Hagiwara) who came into contact with the perpetrators before they committed their crimes.
This is another rewatch for me, and a film I definitely enjoyed the second time around.
There is such a potent, unrelenting sense of unease in this film. The whole thing has a jaundiced color palette, as if the life has already been sucked out of everyone we meet. When there is a spot of brightness---such as the startling red of a dress at the dry cleaner's---it feels more like a warning than a relief from the muted tones. Then there is the way that the film is show, often at a distance from the characters. Close ups are used almost entirely to give us the perspective of a character in a certain moment.
The settings themselves feel unabashedly drawn from the vast well of horror imagery. Mental hospitals with long, dark hallways. Cells made of stone lit with yellow lights. Abandoned buildings where the wind howls through broken windows.
The mystery itself is intriguing. What power, exactly, does Mamiya have over the people he encounters? Through the film we see suggestions that this is a world brimming with anger, such as a man in a shop raving to himself. Is Mamiya simply tapping into some of that rage, or has he found a way to make people do something that is not actually in their hearts? In a later scene,
WARNING: spoilers below
a psychiatrist who realizes he has been "touched" by Mamiya chooses to handcuff himself to a pipe, finally turning his homicidal impulses on himself rather than kill someone else. Was he being taken over, or did he merely realize he had some urge to harm/kill inside?
Hagiwara's performance as Mamiya is enjoyably frustrating. Perpetually evasive, one is never sure if he is playing a game or sincere. Does he understand the effect he has on others? Is his memory loss genuine? Or is it all an act? Either way, it is horrifying.
The first time I watched this film, I really struggled to pay attention to it. Or maybe that's not quite the right way to put it, but I didn't feel like I was in tune with its rhythms. I'd find that I'd spaced out on some dialogue or didn't quite get who a certain character was. It was the same thing this time around, but I think that it's just how I interact with the way the film is shot and edited, which has a kind of dreamy, unanchored feeling to it.
Great stuff, and even knowing how all the twists and turns would pan out I still really loved watching it all play out. Fantastic ending as well.