Japón Movie Review

In 2002, Mexican director Carlos Reygadas burst on the scene with this haunting yet frustrating piece of minimalist filmmaking. Even the title, Japón (spanish for "Japan"), is aggravating in its lack of meaning. But hey, Brazil has nothing to do with the country, so I suppose it's worth a small forgiveness. (It turns out Brazil inspired the title of Japón... who'd a thunk?)

The story is almost painful in its simplicity: A suicidal painter arrives deep in the mountainous Mexican countryside and finds an old woman willing to let him live in her barn for a spell, at least for long enough for him to commit suicide. That's it. The man, who has no name in the film and is played by Alejandro Ferretis, hobbles around aimlessly, offers "marihuana" to his landlady, stumbles upon dead animals, and finally -- in what may or may not be meant to be the film's "shocking" climax, stuffily asks the old woman if she'll have sex with him. (She does, and the way Reygadas captures the attempted coupling with all the warmth and tenderness of an OB/GYN clinic -- "Move your leg. No, higher." -- might be enough to turn you off of Japón altogether.)

Then again, I suppose you're supposed to wonder whether "the man" really offs himself in the end. This question is indeed answered in the final scene, after the lovemaking has left him in tears, though it's hardly a satisfying conclusion. In fact, even at well over two hours long, the movie feels like it is suddenly aborted. And yet, the whole affair is obese in length and overflowing in pretension like so many prototypical art films. As a first-time director, Reygadas just doesn't have the chops to pull off a meditative thinkpiece about suicide, never mind the geriatric sex scene. And still it has such tantalizing flashes of ability, both technical and creative, that it's conceivably worth checking out if this sounds remotely like your kind of scene.