It gets a little tedious to relate current events to old movies so apologies dear reader, but while watching this film I couldn't help but think of the heartless voices in American politics that suggested old people sacrifice themselves for the good of the economy during the pandemic this year. It also made me think of Make Way for Tomorrow (1937) and Midsommar (2019), and maybe that's all you need to know (and then some).
Bless the little old lady at its center (Kinuyo Tanaka) - she's so sweet, and certainly contributes to the family by catching fish, hauling the harvest, and cooking, which makes her treatment even more heartbreaking. Whether the practice of obasute is legendary or not, it's easy to see a real-world parallel to how older people are too often forgotten, shoved aside, or abused, which may touch some painful chords in the viewer.
Here we see cruelty that is at times blunt (her annoying-as-hell grandson), ritualized (perhaps to help rationalize it), and in some sense born out of brutal economic need (food is a luxury, and making white rice once a year is a special treat). It all reflects losing our humanity with how we treat the elderly. The film lags a little bit in its last half hour, but it absolutely brims with emotion. The kabuki styling of the storytelling from director Keisuke Kinoshita is delightful, and made me think of our painful little lives as on the stage, each in one role today, and another tomorrow.
