How did director Jun Ichikawa's masterpiece ``Tony Takitani'' express that special atmosphere?

“Tony Takitani” synopsis

Tony Takitani's name was really Tony Takitani. Tony has always been lonely. I thought it was okay to be lonely. Tony, who became a successful illustrator, eventually fell in love with a beautiful woman like never before. He had finally met the love of his life, and the lonely time of his life was over. The only thing that bothered him was that his wife bought too many clothes. His fleeting happiness was lost when his wife died in an accident, leaving him with only a wardrobe full of size 7 clothes. Tony recruits a woman who is the same size as his wife to be his assistant, and tells her that he wants her to wear his wife's clothes as a uniform...

Index

• Visualization of Murakami's literature by a master artist
• Take photos just by looking at them
• A movie where the wind passes through
• What is the “salvation” added by Director Ichikawa?

Visualization of Murakami's literature by a master artist

It is extremely difficult to visualize Murakami's literature. In the first place, it is said that it is difficult to get permission for a long film, and compared to that, it seems that there is still some potential for a short story, but after all, it has a unique writing style, rhythm, and worldview. As a creator, I knew from the beginning that if I ignored it, it would lead to painful results.

Director Jun Ichikawa, who always thinks of images when he reads a book, was well aware of the difficulty of this. However, he felt that there was something different about this short story, ``Tony Takitani.'' To put it simply, the story is about a lonely man who gains something and becomes lonely again. Rather than being filled with something, it's a story about something gradually being lost, and before you know it, it becomes like an ``empty wardrobe.''

What's distinctive about it is the calm rhythm that doesn't give you any sense of the narrator's emotions, and the atmosphere that makes you feel like you're floating a few centimeters above the ground. What does Jun Ichikawa, a master craftsman known for many masterpiece commercials representing the Showa and Heisei eras and masterpiece films such as `` Tsugumi '' (1990), `` Tokiwa-so's Youth '' (96), and `` Tokyo Yokyoku '' (1997), do with these? Has it materialized?

I still clearly remember being shocked by the opening of this movie when I first encountered it in the screening room 15 years ago. The moment Hidetoshi Nishijima uttered, in a completely silent tone, ``Tony Takitani's real name was really Tony Takitani,'' the clarity of his vision deepened, and I realized that Murakami's work could only be made into a film. I felt like I was being sucked into a new horizon in an impossible way.

　Along with the melancholy melody played by Ryuichi Sakamoto , the images slide side to side at the slow speed of turning the pages of a book. However, throughout the video, the performers hum the phrases from the novel, and the punctuation mark-like lingering sound enhances the scent even more.

Because the images, music, and the actors' expressions and narrations play out in such a harmonious way, the movie ``Tony Takitani'' feels as if it had been standing here long before we arrived. , it had acquired a somewhat lonely and ephemeral presence.

Take photos just by looking at them