August at Akiko's

Alex is a jazz sax performer. He searches for his ancestral home and befriends various people. This is meditative. It has a Zen tone with its fly-on-the-wall style filming. Filmmaker Christopher Makoto Yogi is doing everything himself. It's a micro indie. I like its style and tone. I just don't like the jazz music. It would be more soothing if the music is classical and more fitting to the movie's tone.

I loved this movie. It's a rare piece of cinematography opening immediately with amazing photography and very well pondered silences that enrich the scenes and take you to a slower pace, a pace that needs your attention and presence. This is what this movie does, it leads you through some "breathing exercises". We all breath everyday but when we focus on breathing all of the sudden it becomes more deep and important. Everyday motions acquire meaning and beauty when we change our frenzy rhythm into mindfulness. Hawaii is portrayed just as it is and so are the people in the movie. Yet it never resembles a documentary rather a poem. The plot is marvelous, surfacing a bit at a time until the final disclosure. Music and the creation of one's inner song are central. I highly recommend this movie if you are searching, if poetry and ore music makes sense to you, if you see silence as beauty.

If you have ever practiced Zen or been to Hawaii this movie offers almost nothing. Unbelievably dull, the director/writer is afraid to have anything happen. Alex broods, Alex walks through the jungle, Alex smokes. Maybe there is enough for a 5 minute movie. This would be pathetic as a high school project. Although professionally made the movie lacks in almost every area that brings one to the cinema. There is one undeveloped idea and it isn't original, nor is it told in a unique way. If you are convinced by faux spirituality or want to tell your friends you saw this "cool" movie, this is for you. In its own way it is pretentious as it pretends to be about something. All style, very little heart. One scene I cared about. Sophomoric. A film with some similar themes - majestic, wondrous, beautiful, quiet, spare - Zen Diaries. This film is - I guess - a micro indie. I am perfectly OK with that, but I wish the filmmaker had something fresh or original to say. Tortured saxophonist who smokes and has tattoos goes to Hawaiian island and something "mystical" sort of happens. Too much half-baked ennui, too many caves. Not sufficient. The little girl was adorable. Perhaps the director can write an actual script with character arcs. This was not worth my time. Too little to say.

The only good thing in this movie is that Alex, who plays a baritone sax, improves during the length of the movie. While the cinematography is visually delightful, the plot reveals nothing - no rising action, no climax, no falling action, no conclusion. The pace is plodding; the ending reminded me of the musical representation of a Noh or kabuki play.

The cinematography was good, although some of the shots lingered far too long. However since the entire movie basically consisted of various camera shots, they needed each to last awhile to take up time.

No one filmed seemed to be an actor and there were only a few scenes with much dialogue. The dialogue was random and basically just what people would say in general conversation. I like this area of the Big Island which was the only reason I or anyone would have a reason to keep watching a film which was just shots of different locations and life there. Any attempt at a plot might have made this move closer to being an actual movie.