Female Film Critics 24/375
Seven Weeks documents a complicated memoriam. In Seven Weeks, the second film in Japanese director Nobuhiko Obayashi’s trilogy on war, he asserts that for every death, someone takes that person’s place. Honoring the importance of an individual’s passing, he proposes to “take a look at one tiny tale of a death” because with each “there is a story.”
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Hanagatami, the third in Japanese director Nobuhiko Ôbayashi’s war trilogy, unfolds more like a stream of consciousness than a linear narrative. This makes it both refreshingly unconventional and formally striking. However, at just under three hours running time, it is also exhausting and frustrating as it circles back on itself several times.
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In Casting Blossoms to the Sky Japanese writer/director Nobuhiko Ôbayashi mounts a plea for peace, kindness, and compassion through a blizzard of images. Dedicated “To the children of the future from adults who lived the past,” the film layers memories of wartime tragedies and natural disasters, primarily WWII cluster bombs dropped on Nagaoka and the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake.
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