Moments before the beginning of a Hong Kong
International Film Festival screening
The Last Blossom (Japan, 2025)
- Baku Kinoshita, director and co-scriptwriter (with Kazuya Konomoto)
- Voice actors: Kaoru Kobayashi, Junki Tozuka, Pierre Taki, Hikari Mitsushima, Yoshiko Miyazaki
- Part of the HKIFF's Animation Unlimited program
For those people who still think that anime is just for children: check out The Last Blossom. Okay, yes, it has a child character (Kensuke is voiced by 30-something-year old Natsuki Hanae) and even a talking flower (voiced by Pierre Taki). But this truly is a mature dramatic work about an elderly, dying yakuza serving a life sentence looking back at his life and reflecting in particular on the phase of his life back in the 1980s when he lived with the love of his life, devoted single mother Nana.
Such is the length of the time line of The Last Blossom's story that both lead character Minoru and Nana are voiced by not one but two people; with Kaoru Kobayashi supplying Minoru's younger voice, Junki Tozuka his older one, Hikari Mitsushima voicing Nana in the 1980s and Yoshiko Miyazaki in the 21st century. Yet I must confess that I only realised this when looking at the film credits!
Meanwhile, the Housenka flower is voiced by only one actor despite it appearing in flashback scenes taking place in the 1980s (when it was growing in the garden of the house that Minoru, Nana (who he chose not to marry so as to ensure that she would be unsaddled with yazuka connections) and her son Kensuke lived) and as a potted plant in Minoru's prison cell that Minoru talks to in the early 21st century period. (More than incidentally: the audience of The Last Romance is informed that young and dying humans can hear the Housenka flower's utterances. Also, people who are seriously ill (who may recover rather than die).)
Such fancifulness is the exception rather than the rule in this sombre, evenly paced film that poignantly details a long, deep love and what Minoru was willing to do for the woman he loved, and also the sacrifices that he made not only for her but also Kensuke -- who Nana had accused Minoru of not thought of as his son -- and his yakusa boss/"older brother". But director Kinoshita also is to be credited for making sure there is beauty in what would otherwise be an overly sad work: visually, including via a hanami fireworks display one festive evening; and with music, notably via inspired use of the classic Stand By Me tune.
Beautifully rendered throughout, The Last Blossom is visually impressive. But what makes it a thoroughly as well as quietly absorbing watch is its touching story revolving around a taciturn yet very understandable main character -- filled with regret but also imbued with a stubborn belief that defeat can be turned into victory in the final stretch with just one great move -- that tugs at the heart.
My rating for this film: 8.0
Year One (Italy, 1974)
- Roberto Rossellini, director and co-scriptwriter (with Marcella Mariani and Luciano Scaffa)
- Starring: Luigi Vannucchi
- Part of the HKIFF's Gala Presentation program
This Roberto Rossellini film was the opening film of the inaugural Hong Kong International Film Festival in 1977. I imagine that it was very well received since the 4K restoration of it was chosen to be screened at the 50th edition of the fest; and got a far better audience reaction than that at the screening I attended, which saw a few walkouts and also people dozing off midway through the movie!
Early on in this neorealist work, its main character, real life Italian politician-statesman Alcide De Gasperi -- a leader of the Christian Democracy party who served as the country's prime minister from December 1945 to August 1953, passing away just one year later -- states that he prefers dialogue to monologue. If only that was so too for Roberto Rossellini, in whose film De Gasperi (as played by Luigi Vannucchi) talks and talks and talks... at great length, and mainly at, rather than to, other people in an efforts to preserve a fragile democracy and turn a country divided and in shambles into one that could offer more to its people!
Year One mainly consists of three type of scenes. The type that features the most has De Gasperi speaking in whole paragraphs -- expounding really -- without much pause, mainly about weighty, political issues, and prompting me to idly wonder how the actor was able to do so without his mouth turning dry and his needing to drink some water! The second type features a Greek chorus or so featuring either the chattering class idly chatting in what looks like a bar situation or fellow politicians in serious discussion over political moves by various figures.
And then there's which this incredibly talky film opened with, and I wish there had been more of: scenes with far more action than dialogue, and which I honestly think conveyed so much more with images than all the words coming out of De Gasperi's mouth did. Including a dramatic World War II bombing scene; another of the terrible aftermath of bombs hitting a village; another showing Rome under Nazi occupation; a fourth showing Rome in the ecstatic moments after its liberation by Allied forces; and a fifth of frenzied rival political campaigning in the first post-war years.
I am sure people who with greater knowledge of Alcide De Gasperi and Italy in general would get far more out of Year One than the likes of me. But, look: I knew about as little about Ghost Elephants before watching Werner Herzog's film about the search of them or Lebanon before viewing Lana Daher's Do You Love Me; and yet found them far more to my liking! Also, it's not often that I come out a movie thinking its story might have been better served as a book or even as a radio show. Or, at the very least, that it really would have been more effective in communicating its entirely serious messages with far less talk, however impassioned, and more action!
My rating for the film: 5.0
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