Tudo Sobre Lily Chou-Chou

The one agreeable thing that can be said about Shunji Iwai is that he makes beautiful images. Lily Chou Chou is his most recent release (and let me state, since someone incorrectly wrote it is pronounced "Choo Choo" it is not, it is spoken "Shoo Shoo"), and one of his most coherent films. For some reason this movie seems to puzzle a lot of people... maybe it is the translation from English to Japanese (I watched the movie in Japanese dialog only, so I don't know if they killed it with subtitles or not), but the movie's plot is really not so complicated. If you know a little bit about Japanese life and culture, the emotions of youth, and devotion to an artist then you can watch this movie and understand it. Even for those who were confused by the plot, another one or two viewing should clear up any misunderstandings. Iwai does have some issues with complicating plot stories, or leaving out plot at all. As a writer he is great, but not perfect. As a director of film and photography he is mind blowing. The images that Iwai creates and displays to the audience are the most beautiful presented. Whether or not the story behind this movie shines to you, the images should be enough to blow your mind. Iwai uses re-occurring themes to present lovely contrasts. He also chose a beautiful selection of music to accompany his film, from Debussy to old Okinawan songs to Lily Chou Chou's own. If you pay attention to the gentle subtleties presented in this film, there is no way you can walk away with your life unchanged. I know this film has changed my life, and has become my main source of inspiration.

I don't know why I bother with Hollywood when there are so many rich projects like this hiding in corners. The problem of course is finding them. The most significant benefit I get from writing IMDb comments is that readers lead me to them. That happened in this case.

If you are an ordinary viewer , you probably won't like this. Its yet another dip into high school angst, overly long and structurally a bit too cute.

I think you'll have to train yourself to watch films lucidly, but if you do, this will be quite effective. You will fall into it and really be influenced, much more viscerally than say "There Will be Blood," where there is no path for us to enter the world we watch.

The matter of this concerns teen alienation, particularly through how we/they take things that happen and weave them into whatever simple, grand narrative is available — usually through commercial pathways. Its a simple chord to strike, but one we all know, both from when we were that age, and from how we live now, which is only a half degree separated.

You'll encounter death, teen prostitution, rape. Gang dynamics involving intense humiliation. Clueless adults of course. Sexual drives and identity vacuums of course, but subordinated to the more overwhelming urge to be part of a cosmic story. Usually, we ignore this in film, because sex and role are inherently more cinematic. Less true, but easier to show as true.

Its the multiply nested structure that makes it work. The scenes are presented non- linearly. The overriding narrative is not what we see, but a collection of instant messages exchanged among the characters we see. These evoke the images we see, perhaps not as they happened, but as they are recalled. There's an overarching cosmos that these text messages reference, an abstract, perfect world of ethereal dynamics conveyed through a goddess, a girl singer. The slightest nuance from, the smallest bit of news about, the slightest rumor concerning this singer provides ledges for a life, for a whole gaggle of lives bumping up against each other.

In the center of this thing, you have a radical departure. All of a sudden, instead of the camera anchored in the test messages, we have a camera rooted in reality. Its literally footage from video cameras from the core teen boys as they go on an exotic vacation to Okinawa. Naturally, the four spindly 14-15 year olds are guided by four of the most appealing older girls in memory. Its colorful, jerky. Full of life, a real, embodied life that by its appearance makes all the rest of the thing seem incredibly sad in its artificiality.

Someone knew what they were doing when they put this together. Someone deep and true and of the kind we need more of if we are to make it through. Or do I hang my life on commercially available narrative too?

Heh.

Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching.

I just watched Lily Chou Chou and I was completely blown away by it. It displayed the struggles of Japanese teens so elegantly. I stayed in Japan for a summer a few years back and attended a high school there. There is a big change going on in Japan's youth today and this is the only time I have seen it portrayed. More films about the real Japan should be made and that's one reason why Iwai is such a good director. He may over do it a little but its what people need to wake up to the struggles in a changing Japan. Americans may think the struggles of being a teen are hard, but Japanese teens have it even harder. Stuck in an extremely difficult academic path without nearly as many choices as we get. That's why escapism through music is so important for them. Its one of their only ways to get out of the social and academic pressures of every day life. The song Glide for me summed up the feeling of the movie. "I wanna be"

Lilly Chou-Chou is quite a perculiar movie experience, there is no over riding message, there is no moment to reflect, everything that this movie expresses appears in an instance and then is lost again in the great 'ether'. Throughout I felt lost, not merely due to the disjointed narrative but the pacing and overall premise did not register to me as 'a movie'. Trying to find meaning in Lilly Chou-Chou is similar to attempting to find meaning in ambient electronic music, as we watch the movie we are detached, the story, so to speak, unfolds gracefully but the audience can not relate to the characters, but can only attempt to make sense of it all.

Lilly Chou-Chou is in my opinion a great achievement of movie making, interms of acting, editing, sound mixing and visual flair, fans of cinema are treated to something entirely fresh, but there is the overall feeling of dissatisfaction, I wanted more from the story, I wanted to see more of the characters, more of their lives and their interaction with one another. Yet the director withholds much of this from the viewer, choosing to present the characters relationships with one another in small doses, leaving the visuals and sound to complement the rest. And this I feel is one of the dissapointments of this movie, so much is conveyed yet so little is actually on screen, the watching of this movie requires a level of understanding of emotions, and the viewer is called upon to make sense of it all.

This would be the movies strongest point, and one of its weakneses. I urge anyone with a curiosity for this movie to watch it.

This is a film that makes you feel more than it makes you think. Combination of poetic images and magnificent music takes you to a new level of emotion. Iwai used emotional space of each characters as well as physical space very well throughout the entire film, it is hard not to make connection with them. This is what the cinema is all about in my humble opinion. Emotions be felt by images and sound.