Moving, Shinji Sōmai’s poetic film about a family going through a divorce, is a prime example of the late director’s talent at portraying adolescence on screen.
Director: Shinji Sōmai
Genre: Drama, Coming of Age
Original title: Ohikkoshi
Run Time: 125′
Original Release: March 20, 1993
Restoration Release: August 9, 2024
Where to watch: at the Metrograph (NY)
To many, particularly in the Western hemisphere, the coming-of-age genre will strike up visions of Stand By Me (1986), Welcome to the Dollhouse (1995), or most of Richard Linklater’s films. Shinji Sōmai and his films, including Moving (1993), stand in the same echelon as these greats, if not higher. Mixing realism with surrealist imagery, Sōmai consistently focussed on issues within young generations, riffing on and modernising themes of fellow countryman Yasujirō Ozu (Late Spring) and clearly influencing the likes of Todd Solondz (Happiness).
In recent years, Sōmai’s films have been shared with wider audiences around the world; a 4K restoration of Typhoon Club (1985) was released in 2023, and will now be followed by the distribution of Moving. DOP Toyomichi Kurita (The Moderns) has overseen the restoration, with Sōmai and the film’s producers no longer alive. With this and other restorations, it is hoped that Sōmai will get the wider recognition he clearly deserves.
Renko (Tomoko Tabata) is a smiley, energetic 6th grader living in Tokyo with her mother and father. It’s a common existence, but we instantly see that this commonality does not translate into happiness. The opening scene of Moving—a standard domestic dinner between the family—is as thorny as it can be, with the mother and father, Nazuna (Junko Sakurada, Born Wild, Run Free) and Kenichi (Kiichi Nakai, When the Last Sword Is Drawn) respectively, on the cusp of separation. After Kenichi leaves, Ren and Nazuna are left living alone, but both struggle to adapt to their new freedoms. Tabata is the shining light of Moving, a cheeky presence who also shows great emotional range in the film’s more distressing moments.
From here, Satoshi Okonogi and Satoko Okudera’s (Wolf Children) screenplay artfully charts the resultant highs and lows, honing in on the specifics of Ren’s journey. They find the inherent weirdness in kids (a young boy plays a recorder with his nose), something which Sōmai brilliantly amplifies, but also the naivety, impressionability, and intelligence that youngsters have. They are as much like adults as they are different, with both generations still figuring so much of life’s complications out. Moving is emotionally resonant, but it also has a lot of fun in its environments and with its characters.
Sōmai’s singular style is in full swing throughout Moving. At times, his film has all the domestic stasis of an Ozu film; at others, it rings with the restless energy of François Truffaut’s The 400 Blows. But despite these obvious influences, Moving always feels unique. It doesn’t have the same hectic danger of Typhoon Club, nor does it have the same laid-back vibes of a Linklater film. Instead, Moving is its own, independent work; a depressing, bleak story about the isolation of one young girl from her family. All of them want to be better and happy, but none of them, especially the adults, seem able to achieve that.
Moving’s ending, whilst dramatically and emotionally strong, is overly protracted, and it also seems at pains to over explain everything to the viewer, when subtlety might work better. Subtlety is not something that can be branded on most of Sōmai’s films, but occasionally, the flow between realism and surrealism in Moving can feel disjointed. Nevertheless, the film, which was screened in the Un Certain Regard section at the 1993 Cannes Film Festival, is so deeply poetic and Sōmai’s symbolism, choreography, and control of scenes so unerring that it is impossible not be swept away by the inescapable and haunting amalgamation of hope and pain.
The new 4K Restoration of Moving will screened at the Metrograph (NY) from August 9, 2024 for a one-week theatrical run, as part of their “Shinji Sōmai x 3” retrospective.
