It doesn’t take long for one to see why “Kokuho,” a nearly three hour period piece directed by Sang-il Lee, became Japan’s highest grossing live-action film of all time, as its early minutes feature some of the most thrilling sequences you’d find in the past year of movies. Flashes of violence and failed vengeance in 1960s Nagasaki form an enthralling origin story for its young protagonist, Kikuo (Ryo Yoshizawa), the son of a yakuza boss who, after becoming orphaned, goes under the care of a revered Kabuki actor.
But that electric introduction is also a bit of a sleight of hand trick for what the film becomes both thematically and, across its hefty running time, energetically. Instead of a mob saga, this is practically the complete opposite, a sweeping melodrama about a pair of Kabuki actors (Yoshizawa and Ryusei Yokohama) that, as it sprawls across decades, means to mimic the kind of parables that its thespians stage each night. Here, in other words, is a tale of fathers and prodigal sons, brothers and breaches of trust, and the winds of fate.
That conceit shines in a first half that is immersive, handsomely staged and buoyed by a beautiful score. But as the film stretches out, it loses some steam and overindulges into soapier territory and tone; one can’t help but wonder at points where exactly it’s trying to go.
And yet, even as it periodically languishes, the film comes back around, with some moving flourishes, to stamp its idea: To witness these vicissitudes over a lifetime, is to see the beauty, bloodshed and loneliness of true artistic greatness.
Kokuho Not rated. In Japanese, with subtitles. Running time: 2 hours 54 minutes. In theaters.
The post ‘Kokuho’ Review: Over Decades, an Artist’s Life appeared first on New York Times.
