It's a Summer Film!
Oct. 10th, 2021 08:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
osprey_archerIt's a Summer Film! is a love letter to classic samurai films and thus probably even better if you have ever watched a samurai film, which unfortunately I have not, but I found it very enjoyable nonetheless!
Our heroine, Barefoot, and her two best friends decide to make a samurai film in time for the school festival. Unfortunately, Barefoot is having trouble finding an actor to cast as her lead, until she goes to a samurai film festival and sees the perfect leading man in the audience... She shouts out the name of her main character, and the boy whips around, yells "Director Barefoot!" and flees, forcing Barefoot into a goofy madcap chase that briefly distracted me from the question of "How does he know her name?"
It turns out that Rintaro knows Barefoot's name because he's a time traveler! He is a HUGE fan of Barefoot's work, but unfortunately her first film has been lost, although there is evidence that it was screened one time at the school's summer festival... So Rintaro traveled back in time to see it. Alas, the fact that he has been cast as one of the two leading samurai means that the film will have to be destroyed after the festival, as he is not supposed to exist in the past!
To be honest I found the time travel the weakest aspect of this story, although this could just be that I found it a bummer when Rintaro explains that no one watches films in the future. (Rintaro, one presumes, is the future version of someone who nowadays would read obscure Victorian novels, a pastime to which people tend to respond with glazed incomprehension.) To be fair, this is part of the point! Barefoot finds it a bummer too! She nearly gives up on her movie because what's the point making films at all if film is just going to die?
However, the youthful shenanigans of our young filmmakers are a delight. I especially enjoyed Barefoot's one-sided rivalry with the other girl who is making a film for the school festival: her rival is making a dreamy romantic comedy, which Barefoot scoffs at, until inevitably she and Rintaro fall into a star-crossed love and Barefoot's life turns into a romantic... well, not exactly comedy, given that Rintaro must return to the future and they can never be together... but the tragic weight in the story really goes to "films disappear," and this is in comparison a minor sadness.
Anyway, somehow the love story and the tragedy of the death of film culminates with the two of them enacting a new ending for Barefoot's film (she never did feel fully satisfied with any of her other endings) at the school festival, where they enlist the entire delighted audience as extras in a samurai battle fought with brooms, which of course ends with Barefoot and Rintaro dueling each other and shouting about the nature of love! and art! and bringing film back to the future! which Rintaro promises to do, inspired by Barefoot's example!
I say "somehow" because the theater run into technical difficulties at the climactic moment and the picture cut out right when we were about to see Barefoot's film! They did get it playing eventually, but I'm almost certain we skipped something, because when it started up again, we didn't see any of Barefoot's film at all, and Barefoot was rousing everyone up for the broom battle. The theater just had to have troubles at exactly the wrong moment, which made the ending a little confusing and totally borked the momentum. Oh well. It was still a fun journey, even if the vagaries of technology threw off the ending a bit.
Our heroine, Barefoot, and her two best friends decide to make a samurai film in time for the school festival. Unfortunately, Barefoot is having trouble finding an actor to cast as her lead, until she goes to a samurai film festival and sees the perfect leading man in the audience... She shouts out the name of her main character, and the boy whips around, yells "Director Barefoot!" and flees, forcing Barefoot into a goofy madcap chase that briefly distracted me from the question of "How does he know her name?"
It turns out that Rintaro knows Barefoot's name because he's a time traveler! He is a HUGE fan of Barefoot's work, but unfortunately her first film has been lost, although there is evidence that it was screened one time at the school's summer festival... So Rintaro traveled back in time to see it. Alas, the fact that he has been cast as one of the two leading samurai means that the film will have to be destroyed after the festival, as he is not supposed to exist in the past!
To be honest I found the time travel the weakest aspect of this story, although this could just be that I found it a bummer when Rintaro explains that no one watches films in the future. (Rintaro, one presumes, is the future version of someone who nowadays would read obscure Victorian novels, a pastime to which people tend to respond with glazed incomprehension.) To be fair, this is part of the point! Barefoot finds it a bummer too! She nearly gives up on her movie because what's the point making films at all if film is just going to die?
However, the youthful shenanigans of our young filmmakers are a delight. I especially enjoyed Barefoot's one-sided rivalry with the other girl who is making a film for the school festival: her rival is making a dreamy romantic comedy, which Barefoot scoffs at, until inevitably she and Rintaro fall into a star-crossed love and Barefoot's life turns into a romantic... well, not exactly comedy, given that Rintaro must return to the future and they can never be together... but the tragic weight in the story really goes to "films disappear," and this is in comparison a minor sadness.
Anyway, somehow the love story and the tragedy of the death of film culminates with the two of them enacting a new ending for Barefoot's film (she never did feel fully satisfied with any of her other endings) at the school festival, where they enlist the entire delighted audience as extras in a samurai battle fought with brooms, which of course ends with Barefoot and Rintaro dueling each other and shouting about the nature of love! and art! and bringing film back to the future! which Rintaro promises to do, inspired by Barefoot's example!
I say "somehow" because the theater run into technical difficulties at the climactic moment and the picture cut out right when we were about to see Barefoot's film! They did get it playing eventually, but I'm almost certain we skipped something, because when it started up again, we didn't see any of Barefoot's film at all, and Barefoot was rousing everyone up for the broom battle. The theater just had to have troubles at exactly the wrong moment, which made the ending a little confusing and totally borked the momentum. Oh well. It was still a fun journey, even if the vagaries of technology threw off the ending a bit.
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Date: 2021-10-11 01:50 am (UTC)Rather ironic/meta technical difficulties, given the plot! Sounds like it was a fun time, otherwise.
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Date: 2021-10-11 05:07 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-10-11 06:43 am (UTC)You might like Beat Takeshi's 2003 version of the Blind Swordsman films: Zatoichi. There is a very good climactic clog dance,.
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Date: 2021-10-11 05:08 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-10-11 09:59 am (UTC)Maybe this is an elaborate performance art piece. You were part of the installation!!
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Date: 2021-10-11 05:09 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-10-14 02:14 pm (UTC)a samurai battle fought with brooms, which of course ends with Barefoot and Rintaro dueling each other and shouting about the nature of love! and art! and bringing film back to the future! --This sounds like conversations in your books! ... minus that last one, but in principle that last one, too, for sure. I can imagine Megan and Sarah doing that argument.
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Date: 2021-10-14 02:28 pm (UTC)Ha, yes, I'm a bit sad actually I never thought to have my characters duel with brooms as they discuss the nature of Art and Love! It would have fit in perfectly in Ashlin & Olivia. But it's really a scene that works better in a visual medium, so it's just as well that it's in this movie instead! I don't have the background to know for sure, but I strongly suspect that Barefoot and Rintaro are recreating some classic samurai duel moments in this battle - there's definitely at least one which Barefoot acted out earlier on her own.
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Date: 2021-10-14 02:29 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2022-02-26 03:09 am (UTC)Because, because, because, the Japan Foundation is screening this film as part of its 2022 film festival! You have to make an account, but it's free--and you can see the film! Here: https://watch.jff.jpf.go.jp
Wakanomori and I had watched one film yesterday (a very good one called in English "Aristocrats"), and tonight he picked this one, and I didn't remember the title. But as the film started rolling, I had this strange sense of déjà vu... actually déjà lit, as in I read it in your entry here. And it was just fabulous; I really loved it! (And I *have* seen samurai films, and yes, it did enhance the experience) All the friends were so wonderful--all the kids were wonderful. I loved the friend Blue Hawaii who was actually a rom-com fan; I loved Kickboard with her knowledge of time travel, and I really really loved Barefoot herself, who reminded both me and Waka tremendously of the ninja girl.
Anyway: if you want to go back and watch those missing minutes, you have until the end of the day tomorrow. 😘
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Date: 2022-02-26 03:42 am (UTC)I went and watched the bit that I missed and it's true that I didn't miss that much, BUT on the other hand it's so great to have seen the whole thing now, and so satisfying to rewatch the broom fight! Just a truly perfect moment of cinema right there. And so great that Barefoot reminded you so much of the ninja girl!
It looks like the festival runs through the 28th so I may have time to watch another film. Will have to contemplate which one to choose!
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Date: 2022-02-26 03:45 am (UTC)(But it's also true that I haven't had a look at the other contenders...)