映画『一枚のハガキ』の分析 : 場の象徴と凝縮されたセリフ

Ichimai no Hagaki (“One Postcard”) is the last movie of director Shindo Kaneto. Upon the movie’s completion, he was aged 97 years and one of the world’s oldest active film directors. The movie won several domestic awards, and many critics believe it to be his masterpiece. This film has two features that are often found in his films: the symbolic meaning of location and a script of sophisticated density.

In this movie, the sea for Keita and the house for Tomoko have symbolic meanings. For Keita, the sea is a place of death: many of his comrades in the Second World War died at sea. After the war, Keita is inactive and spends many years living alone close to the sea. He then decides to emigrate to Brazil: he believes that if he goes to live on the other side of the ocean, he will be able to escape his life in Japan. However, by the end of the story, he decides to marry Tomoko, a woman who lives in the mountains. She has no desire to go overseas but gives Keita hope to live.

Tomoko is somehow bound to the house in which she lives: she is unable to leave her old home even though she lives there alone before meeting Keita. However, when her house becomes destroyed by fire, she finds release and is able to marry Keita to begin a new life.

In this film, a good deal of information is conveyed in the terse words spoken by its characters. Much important information is deliberately unspoken. This concise presentation of information is an important feature of Kaneto’s work, though it has not previously been observed. This movie clearly shows the characteristics of Kaneto’s work.