Rurô no tsuki

Is reality exactly how it is always presented to us? That I think is the bigger question that the director is trying to answer with this film. The media present us with a narrative: a juvenile is arrested for kidnapping a child. Parties not involved in the incident present us with a narrative: the juvenile in question is nothing but a pedophile. However, how do the main characters of this story themselves view what had happened? Is reality as black-and-white as we might think or want it to be?

What I liked: The cinematography and score of this movie really captured my attention, just like the storyline. The story is layered with rich character development and you come to feel like you really know the character. An aspect of the storyline that I found interesting is how the person we would expect to be evil might not be and the person we might expect to be good might not be that either.

What I didn't like: The movie could have benefitted from a tighter editing to shorten it as it felt a bit too draggy by the end. The story might appear to be too depressing to some as well. Despite the rich characterization of the leads, the movie might have benefitted from an examination into why the male lead chose to "give shelter" to the female lead at the beginning of the story.

Please be advised that the movie has a few distressing scenes of violence and abuse which might be triggering to some.

The film depicts a melancholy story about a pair of a young women and a man who devoted each other with love and comfort to escape the world that hurts them. Through the story unfolds, I acknowledge something that I find myself most difficult to understand is that: 'the characters eventually choose to escape, to lie and to wander but no to fight, to explain or to have a conversation. ' of course some explanations can be provide to support their motivation but I still worries for those protagonists :'will they wandering forever ?'

The visual presentation shares the features of the mainstream of Modern Japanese Drama and mystery which is, simply, pure and natural. Like the protagonist's eyes, they are unadorned, clean and neat, which serves the story.