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In 1998 the Japanese director Hirokazu Koreeda astonished those of us who feel passionately about the expressive power of cinema with "After Life" a film about the hereafter that I would claim to be one of the masterworks of the past decade. The effect of this was so mesmerising that for some time I completely forgot about "Maborosi" an earlier work that I had caught up with only a few days before. Although not in the same league, it is worth a look if only to trace the origins of the later piece. Just as "After Life is a meditation on life from the point of view of the dead, "Maborosi" reverses the process and meditates on death from the living's perspective. A young girl feels somehow responsible for the death of her grandmother whom she cannot persuade to return to the family home after she wanders off one day. As a young woman she again is unable to escape a feeling of guilt when her husband is unaccountably struck down and killed by a train. These events happen fairly quickly in the first third of the film. The rest is an elegiac account of her second marriage to a widower with a young daughter and their life together in a remote fishing community as far away from the cramped streets of the city as it is possible to imagine. With the baby son by her first husband now grown to a small boy the new family feels complete. And yet the woman still exists in a state of unease. Although there are no more disasters, there are continual reminders of the frailty of life. An elderly woman, not unlike her grandmother, takes a boat out in a storm but returns unharmed. On a later occasion she watches an anonymous funeral procession which seems held in longshot for an eternity. "Marobosi" which means "The Beckoning Light" - a clear reference to death - is full of the influences of other directors. There is that of Ozu in the many domestic interiors where the camera seldom moves, Angelopoulos in the many long held exterior vistas and even Hou Xiaoxian in the way the audience is made to concentrate hard to work out character reactions and situations given a minimum of verbal and visual information. One curious fact about the film is the way the characters either appear in shadow or middle distance so that their emotions are hard to recognise. In the end this effect of deliberately distancing the protagonists is the film's essential weakness. It gives a sense of detachment and uninvolvement that Koreeda was to overcome triumphantly in the marvellous "After Life".

Rarely do I rate films so highly, but Maborosi earned it's nine. A large part of my enjoyment of the film was due to the beautiful and subtle directing that seemed to compliment the story itself perfectly. Koreeda is a very promising Japanese director. I recommend this one to all serious movie watchers, and I await his future films.

A slow paced film that lets you have some empathy for a life changed by inexplicable loss, diverted to unexpected place and contemplation. Despite the intensity possible in the theme, the behavior is a compelling mixture of detachment and continuation of everyday activity, while underneath you can see the memories are unresolved. Some nice acting, especially if you can attune yourself to subtleties of normal life and are not expecting "larger than life" displays. The photography is beautiful and alternates with the acting in setting the mood and being the focus of attention.

I watched the US DVD version, which has somewhat disappointing video quality. You can see the director took some spectacular imagery which I have got to hope came out better on film, because on the DVD the resolution is muddy at times and some of the color is flat. It is just a bit better than VHS. A real pity they could not make a better digital transfer of such a visual artwork. Most of the soundtrack is voices and background environment which fits perfectly with the film, there is one sequence with (very effective) music soundtrack.

I was fortunate to see Maborosi on a large screen at the Joslyn Art Museum. The venue was appropriate, for this film stands as one of the great achievements of the cinema. Indeed, I will go out on a long limb and argue that it deserves comparison to Carl Theodor Dreyer's Passion of St. Joan of Arc. Light, shadow, angle: in my experience these two films apply the most basic elements of cinematography in a most remarkable and brilliant fashion.

Maborosi opens with an astonishing shot, as the viewer looks up from one end of an arching bridge to see a young child following an old woman. The shot is meticulously framed by light posts, giving the impression of a picture on canvas. The camera remains still while the two actors proceed through the scene. The director's brilliant eye for placing everything "just right" immediately catches one's attention. It is a virtuoso shot; and then one's amazement grows as scene after scene continues with no drop off in the careful, artful composition of each image. After awhile, the viewer may become conscious of the camera: it does not move. As each scene commences, the activity occurs within a new, steady frame. I think that the camera moves during a scene only three times in the film, and then only in side-to-side pans. However, I was so enthralled with the film I may easily have overlooked some motion.

The story, concerning a young women's travail in overcoming the grief of her suicided husband, plays out quietly and slowly. The actors speak sparingly, and emotions are primarily portrayed through facial and bodily expression. The impact is large and plumbs depths. If a film like this were made in Hollywood--an utterly absurd idea--I'm sure the characters would be babbling on at each other. Maborosi explores the virtues of silence, patience, and careful attention: behaviors which are not widely cultivated in contemporary cinema, or in contemporary society for that matter.

Maborosi is a film to captivate those who want to see cinema which strives to be more than mere entertainment. It is in every sense an "art film," but in my mind it stands as one of those very rare films which emphasize the artful without a hint of the self-conscious and annoying artsy. A monumental achievement.

The title of the film comes from a Japanese word that loosely translates into "illusory light". A maborosi is an inexplicable mirage that sporadically unveils itself along the waves of the sea, leading many curious sailors to their impending doom. Nobody questions where this mysterious light originates from; nobody wonders why so many men are lured by the maborosi's false promises of otherworldly beauty. The answers are patently unexplainable, leaving no feasible alternative but submissive acceptance and temperate remembrance. There are many aspects of this world whose origins are rationally indecipherable; perpetual mysteries as perplexing as the shifting of the tides or the changing of the seasons, the rising of the sun or the positioning of the stars, the birth of a son or the death of a father. The lesson of the maborosi is quite comforting in its reductive simplicity; there are some tragedies in life that cannot be readily understood or accounted for, but these setbacks should always be treated with a tacit acceptance of the unalterable past, and an unbroken willingness to overcome.

Yumiko is confronted with such a confounding loss following the unanticipated death of her husband, Ikuo, an otherwise cheerful individual occasionally prone to brief interludes of somberness and incredulity. As the film opens, we are shown passing indicators of the memories that will continue to haunt Yumiko long after her husband has departed: the stolen bicycle that the couple re-painted together, the intrusively endless loop of train-tracks that entangle the neighborhood, the dark empty hallways of a home encompassed by unfulfilled hopes and abandoned promises. These are the lingering images of a time long since passed, but never forgotten; the remaining links to a previous era divided by enigmatic fate, replacing the comforts of life's certainties with an encircling string of unanswerable inquiries. As Yumiko struggles to combat her own doubts and insecurities, her regrets and reservations, she is forced to reconcile the unaccountable cause for her grief with the prospect of an eventual regeneration of love and companionship. While Yumiko cannot escape from the memories of her past, she can still find hope in embracing an unforeseen direction, discovering solace and comfort in the arms of another man. But even the blissful serenity of the ocean's archaic blue cannot remove the painful memorials from the deepest recesses of Yumiko's imagination. The crashing of the offshore waves does not represent the progressive cleansing of the past, but the uninterrupted calamity of the storm, suggesting that Yumiko's thoughts are just as violently conflicted as the impartial forces of her surroundings.

Yumiko's struggle to assimilate her ways into an unfamiliar terrain is further compounded by the insolvable puzzle echoing throughout the barren corners of her new home, reverberating off the timeless waves of the indifferent sea. In spite of this continuous anxiety, there are many fleeting moments that would indicate a sense of personal advancement: images of a family finding comfort in each other's tragedy, reciprocally seeking to forge new identities out of an identical past. Some of the film's most memorable scenes occur with Yumiko's new found source of compassion, as Koreeda primarily focuses on the more joyful, celebratory moments of a strengthening bond between intimate strangers. However, a return visit to the city of Osaka brings back a flood of painful reminders, returning Yumiko to her previous state of inescapable depression. The journey further complicates the delicate situation unfolding within the confounding confines of her deepening psychological turmoil, exacerbating the tensity of her gradual acclimatization. Yumiko's inability to fully commit herself to her second husband is a direct consequence of her inability to comprehend the destabilizing effects of her innermost fixation; a persistent uncertainty concerning the nature of death, and a refusal to receptively acknowledge that which we cannot control.

Koreeda's transcendent depiction of the esoteric natural beauty of Yumiko's rural environment is a calculated effort to further reinforce the principle message of the film, which is simply the message of the maborosi. Why does Yumiko's husband selfishly succumb to the unfathomable temptations of the mystic light beyond the horizon? Why does the maborosi indiscriminately engulf the souls of its unwarranted victims? These are questions without answers, frustratingly enlightening reminders of the limits of our mortality, and the fragility of our most basic human certainties. The point of the film, however, is not to mock or ridicule our rational sensibilities, nor does Koreeda intend to paint an exceedingly bleak portrait of untenable despair and incomprehensible misfortune. Rather, the lesson of the maborosi is an alleviating reaffirmation of hope and anticipation, providing an acceptable resolution to an inconclusive affliction, dispensing clues to the solution of one of life's greatest riddles. The maborosi fable teaches us that closure cannot begin without acceptance, and that acceptance is ultimately earned through procession.

I don't think I have ever witnessed a film, in which the cinematography was so outstanding that it really was the star of the picture. This film, about a Japanese woman who remaries and moves to a small fishing village after her last husband comits suicide is less about the story but more about its surroundings. Scenes are mostly taken and shot from a distance with little camera movement, in a way they become living paintings. Blues, reds, and greens come in to accent shots, moving vehicles enter to give splash of colour and brilliant contrast. The actors are distant. I couldn't take my eyes let alone blink for the fear of missing something amazing. The simple act of a child throwing a pink ball, to the sunlit rooms that get illuminated, to blue paint in fishing boats it all had me engrossed. I found myself more as a participant in a museum gallery of high art than being engaged in a plot or story not that there isn't one or that it was bad. I have never witnessed a film like this and even found that just the scenes themselves and the background of story brought so much emotion out of me.

A remarkable piece of cinema

Rating 9 out of 10

Wow, there are some pretty extreme reviews of this film. I've read both the LOVED ITs and the HATED ITs, and I agree with both. So what's the deal? Is this the best film ever, or should it be used as a torture device at Guantanamo Bay?

All I can say is that I experienced moments of both extremes, but in the end I was unsatisfied. It begins provocatively with an interesting flashback, told very poetically through high contrast shots with deep perspective. This sets the tone very nicely and even manages to inject some suspense into the film. But the movie's downfall is excessive, gratuitous repetition in the hours that follow.

The plot develops suddenly within the first 30 mins or so. From then on, don't expect much of a story because the rest is a highly impressionistic mood-type piece with little dialogue and less action. That's not necessarily a bad thing; directors like Ming-liang Tsai (THE HOLE) have pulled it off successfully, but what irked me in this case was the gratuitous repetition. Yes, I know I said "gratuitous repetition" already. Good to see you're paying attention ;)

I counted 5 scenes (long ones) of the heroine sitting in a dark room staring out a window with a ghostly light illuminating her face. It was stirring the first time, but after a few more times it's simply redundant & anticlimactic. Another great image--used powerfully at first but losing its charm after the 3rd or 4th beating over the head--is a far shot of a body of water where our eye is drawn to the reflections of people on the surface. OK, Koreeda, we get the picture; the film is about the contrast between shadows and bright light, reality and deceptive illusion, that which we do not understand vs. that which we *think* we understand. If it were presented more concisely, I would have loved it. But did he really require 2 hours to say it? And if so, could he not have explored it more deeply, rather than leaving us with a somewhat shallow climactic monologue at the end? (I call it a 'monologue', but actually it's only 2 or 3 sentences which summarize the whole point of the film.)

In the end, my impression of MABOROSHI is much like my impression of Koreeda's later film AFTER LIFE (which I think is much better than this); the philosophy is very interesting, there are certain poetic moments that will captivate you, but when the film is over you get the feeling that you've just read a haiku. Nothing more.

And beautiful and fascinating film with a gentle lyric quality. Runs directly counter to the usual Hollywood expectations. The most emotionally packed scene is filmed in extreme longshot! You can't even see the faces of the actors but the location and the action that you can see are enough. If you want to see a standard hollywood formula, then stay away. If you like quiet and moving films shot in entirely new ways (granted the director owes much to Ozu) then get this film.

Amazing shots and scenes, Masao Nakabori and Hirokazu Koreeda did some really magnificent work here, and although there weren't too many dialogues in this movie but there were some really good ones.

All in all it's a good movie, but for me some long shots were really extreme, although I like that it captures the life of Yukimo as it is, even with its "boringness and slowness" at some point, but it was a bit too much in some scenes, for example the scene where she was walking with her son towards the train station was quite boring.

It's not one of the movies which left me thinking about it after it ended, but it's surely worth watching.

With a cinematic eye that harks back to Kurosawa and the first color features of Antonioni (esp. Red Desert & Blowup), Maborosi is one of the quietest and most delicate little films you will ever see. It is the absolute antidote to fare like Die Hard.

MABOROSI, which means "phantasmic light", is Japanese cinema gradualist Hirokazu Koreeda's feature debut, a minutely restrained drama charting the aftermath of abrupt bereavement.

At first glance (and with some acquired taste), Ozu's influences writ large in the picture, from inanimate pillow shots, natural light (or no ancillary light at least) setting, to its medium-shot, static camera angle, perpetually at a remove, but often lingering longer than usual, with the story's dramatis personae, and Koreeda goes ever further, defiantly ghettoizes our protagonist Yumiko (former volleyball player Makiko Esumi's screen debut) in taciturnity, while the narrative languidly ambles around a nearly ritualistic, quotidian quietness.

In the preamble, Yumiko's grandmother decides to die in her hometown and leaves by foot, never being found again, Yumiko is guilt-ridden because she didn't stop her, and it actualizes as a recurring dream following her into adulthood, contentedly married with Ikuo (Asano), they have just welcomed an infant boy into this world, supposedly it should be a new chapter in their placid but convivial life, yet as augured by an earlier scene where Yumiko meets Ikuo for the first time on the night of her grandmother going missing, Yumiko comes for in another unanticipated bereavement when Ikuo commits an apparently unpremeditated suicide, leaving no explanation behind, which vehemently shatters Yumiko to the core, yet pertaining to Oriental philosophy and decorum, grief and perplexity are seething all too quietly under her outwardly collected mien. Koreeda circumspectly rams home that it is an inward process, time might heal her, or not.

A few years later, when the bicycle Ikuo stole and rode is covered with verdigris, it is the time when Yumiko marries into a new family with her son Yuichi (Kashiyama), transferring themselves to a sleepy coastal village, Yumiko's new hubby Tamio (Naitô), a widower with a young daughter (there is kindred spirit one can bank on) welcomes them to the household and domestic bliss restarts in a routine orbit with formality/intimacy (the latter is contingent on seasons) and bucolic/seaside idyll, all in an unperturbed pace under the adornment of Taiwanese composer Chen Ming-chang's lyrical, dirgeful incidental music. Only a return visit to attend her brother's wedding insidiously compounds Yumiko's discomfiture, she cannot find a closure to let go of the past.

In view of that Japanese is a people who has a perverse propensity of mythologizing suicide, Koreeda's answer to Yumiko's ingrown quest (culminating in a stunning sequence when she follows a cortège near the mudflat, and betrayed by the film's title) predictably partakes of a numinous slant through Tamio's mouth, and, to a certain degree, it leans to an arbitrary placebo aiming for a sigh of resignation in face of the unknown, one wonder whether Yumiko can come to terms with it, as cool as a cucumber she is, Esumi's performance often belies a trace of self-imposed effort.

Alas, to all intents and purposes, Koreeda's maiden work is a laconic but poetic essay, a tasteful if none-too-absorbing artifact, but mostly confidently, a resolute harbinger of a promise that the best is yet to come, which in retrospect, is indubitable.

This is a most audacious debut by Hirokazu Koreeda, who hitherto had simply made a couple of documentaries. There is only a slight story and daringly long held shots but it works. From the very beginning we are spellbound by the framing and specific look of every frame. There is something of the documentary in that there is a feeling we are simply following ordinary people as they go about their lives but the look is so utterly beautiful throughout. Whether a partial facial close-up, the side of a house or street lights on a bridge, all is so framed as to transfix the viewer. A story does gradually unfold and it is as if we are part of it, bound up in the early death of a husband, the development of a young boy and the effect of the environment on the families struggling against the elements. Most impressive and beautiful film.

Steeped in the traditions of the lush visual beauties of Japanese cinema, and influenced by the likes of Taiwanese (?) director Hsiao Hsien Hou (I believe there are several fairly direct quotes) or the luminous cinematography of Bergman's long time cameraman, Sven Nykvist. This film directly mines the visual effects of some of the most glorious European painters of light like Vermeer, Caravaggio, and Georges de la Tour. From the subtitles it seems that MABOROSI means 'strange light' and Kore eda uses almost nothing but strange, rich luminosity to tell his story (although he also gets a fine, somber perfomance from his female lead). Each shot is deeply thought out and composed to the maximum. Literally, every single shot. The results are tranquil and beautiful. The story is as quiet as the light, and probably if you require your film to have a strong direct narrative you should stay away from this as the story is told very subtly using light and almost subliminal sound (it seemed to me there were ocean waves in the sub background even in the city shots, for example). It works great as cinema. I would suggest that you watch at least the first 20 minutes or so again, after watching the whole film. The same motifs cross and criss cross all through the film and it really builds a wonderful texture.

I would recommend this as a double bill with something like the Actor's Revenge by Ichikawa- also deeply steeped in lush visual beauties and light. Or else Angel Dust by Sogo Ishii-a very opposite film full of passion, madness and violence, but where you see that meticulous, relentless search for supercomposition on almost a frame for frame basis. Or lastly, the tranquil, and beautiful, and very painterly Why Has Bodhidharma Left For The East- a Korean film by Bae Yong Kyun and something of a successful Zen meditation. Well one more, Mystery of Rampo-by Kazuyoshi Okuyama- very offbeat with bewitchingly lush visual beauty. (Rampo is Japanese for Edgar Allen Poe and the first Japanese mystery writer adopted Rampo as his nom de plume)

What a beautiful film. . . . .

My 9th Kore-eda and possibly my favourite. One of those where "every frame could be a painting". It's one of the most beautifully shot films I've ever seen. The photography is jaw dropping. We follow a young woman who has just had a tragic event occur - and how she copes with family and the lack of it, is what Kore-eda explores.

There are bikes, cars and trains, signalling journeys to new beginnings. The sound design moves from trains to nature and waves to show us how the young woman is feeling. There are homages to the likes of de Sica. 'Maborosi' means 'trick of the light' in Japanese, there are lots of scenes with shimmering lights and ethereal effects, not unlike those used by Kieslowski to perhaps convey an other worldy presence. There's a shot where a light bulb rocks next to a clock - light and time coexisting together, Kore-eda is showing us the central theme of the film. This is a must watch for all cinephiles, it is one of the greatest films I have ever seen.

Life is just a puzzle. Don't even try and solve it.

As other reviewers have noted this is a very visual, artistic sort of movie. Not much character development or plot, more like snippets of life. A "tone poem." Beautiful to look at, but ultimately not very engaging. Very arthouse.

Koreeda does an amazing job of portraying a woman's grief over her husband's death, and the rediscovery of love, peace, and happiness. One of the previous posters commented that the "quality" of the video wasn't very good, that is incorrect, as I will explain why. Koreeda used natural lighting in the film rather than artificial lighting; the lighting was done this way so as to keep certain things out of focus at times, to keep them indistinguishable. The lighting is a major part of this film, Koreeda uses the lighting to symbolically represent Yumiko's(Protagonist) mood. During certain parts of the film the lighting will almost always be dim and indiscernible, and in other parts it will be more clear and illuminated, the lighting follows the storyline, and Yumiko's progression and digression.

this is hard to get movie if you have not experienced the death of a close friend or family member. it is entirely visual but reflective of mood - the deep void that one retreats to when a lost happens.

when watching a film, the mood of the auther and audience must match to some degree for connection to happen. and for this film, you must be at least 80% close or you will be bored, lost or disinterested.

each scene provide space for you to think, feel, reminisced - not necessary what is happening in the story - maybe in "your" own story. there is a little bit of dialogue in the end to summarize everything.

a masterpiece with great cinematography that reflects on one singular emotion -mourning.

I am sure this movie scores artistic points for its camera work and mood, but at the end of a hard days work, few people can stomach the long, plodding and mostly silent scenes in which the story is not advanced any. Sometimes you just sit there wondering how long till the next piece of dialogue. Of course I am not a real movie critic; I just play one and I don't have a luxury of time, nor do I have the obligation to elaborate on the academic aspects of film making. I will grant that some people enjoyed this movie, but for most it needs more plot, the female lead was enchanting, so it certainly would have been nice to expand her role.

I liked this film. I usually like such films from Japan that emphasizes on the reflection on death and transition from life to death. It made me remembered the style of Ozu, another great visionary from Japan during 1950s. The direction is minimalist and which is why it requires us to contemplate ourselves what exactly happens and why. The losing of one's husband is quite a common trope for me and have seen it in multiple Indian movies in different ways. What differs here is the cinematography and picturesque style to capture moments of one's life after losing someone close. The definition and questions on death are asked to us directly and ultimately Koreeda wants us to think about them our way. Through portraying still frames, the action carried out in the frames show a lot more than what is shown and that is where the communication between the director and us begins. A nice film.

Superb cinematography by Masao Nakabori, a lovely script, creditable editing by the director, an amazing debut by the director Kore-eda and finally an unforgettable performance by the lead actress, the beautiful Makiko Esumi. For me, there were two remarkable sequences--the spare bulb rolling by itself on the table and the funeral procession taken as a long shot (reminding you of "The Seventh Seal" and "8 1/2", all the more striking because of the bare soundtrack). For me, this work of the director is his second best among the seven I have seen so far--the best work being "The Third Murder " One of the key aspects of the film was the effective static long shots of the dwelling entrances in key sequences.