Last weekend I went to the cinema here in Tokyo and for the first time, watched a film in Japanese without english subtitles.
The film was mostly about nothing.
An older man goes about his life as a public toilet cleaner. He notices the way the light moves through the leaves of the trees. He visits the local bathhouse. He eats the same sandwich for lunch everyday. He reads. He sits at a bar. He tends to small plants. He listens to cassette tapes in his car.
Despite the lack of action (and dialogue, obviously, my Japanese is not that good) I was completely immersed and present the entire time. By the time the film ended I couldn’t believe it was over.
Nothing happened, but I was hanging onto every moment as if it were the very edge of something.
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