Tony Takitani (2004)

User Rating:

7.3/10   

Director:

Jun Ichikawa

Writers:

Jun Ichikawa (writer)
Haruki Murakami (novel)

Release Date:

29 January 2005 (Japan)

Genre:

Drama

Plot:

When technical illustrator Tony Takitani asks his wife to resist her all-consuming obsession for designer clothes, the consequences are tragic.

Plot Keywords:

Illustrator | Drawing | Clothes | Clothing | Obsession

Awards:

3 wins & 5 nominations

Cast

Issei Ogata	...	Tony Takitani, Shozaburo Takitani
Rie Miyazawa	...	Konuma Eiko, Hisako
Shinohara Takahumi	...	Young Tony Takitani
Hidetoshi Nishijima	...	Narrator (voice)
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Yumi Endo
Shizuka Moriyama

Runtime:

76 min | Switzerland:75 min | USA:75 min

Country:

Japan

Language:

Japanese

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

Singapore:PG | UK:U | Australia:PG | South Korea:12 | Netherlands:6 | Finland:K-11 | Hong Kong:I | Germany:o.Al.

Filming Locations:

Yokohama, Kanagawa, Japan

Company:

Breath

Movie Connections:

Featured in 2006 Independent Spirit Awards (2006) (TV)

I cannot express the emotions I felt near the end...

What a fantastic movie. It was like watching Picasso paint a masterpiece to ambient music; or like nostalgia captured on film. Quite simply, one of the most beautiful movies I have ever had the pleasure to experience. I always say that a movie does me good if it does one of the following:

1) entertains (action, comedy, sci-fi)

2) makes me feel (anger, laughter, sadness, etc...)

I don't see movies to think, because a "thinking man's" movie is really just a boring movie. I don't count documentaries in this category, because those are works of non-fiction, and although they can be entertaining and thought provoking, they aren't usually considered "works of art". I see movies that make me feel like I've spent the past 2 hours, or so, either having fun, or feeling emotions, both of which makes living life worth while. In the case of Tony Takitani, I watched a movie which had me feeling a set of emotions that are hard to define; a complicated stream of otherworldly feelings that I could maybe describe as being nostalgia coupled with a sense of regret. It's a sad, melancholy feeling, and it is complex, like a fine wine. Only a few movies, or events in my life, have given me this hard to capture emotion, but when it happens, it's like discovering an old love letter from your by-gone youth, a picture too, perhaps, of a person you have long forgotten, but had a deep love for. Sometimes, a fine piece of poetry does it for some people, music others, but for me, it's all in a movie.

Tony Takitani is one of those rare movies that will make you feel. If it makes you feel bored, then go watch Survivor or The Real World. Lots of drama for you there.