Summary
A charming and idiosyncratic tale of a young woman with a duck lamp who also happens to see dead people.
Opening as it does with a storybook full of miniatures, followed closely by a quirky young woman carrying a duck lamp, you’d be forgiven for thinking that Wes Anderson has made a second film in Japan this year. ROOM LAUNDERING (ルームロンダリング) is, in fact, the debut feature from TV director Kenji Katagiri, who marks himself as an exciting new voice to watch with a mixture of offbeat humour that is intrinsically Japanese but simultaneously universal.
This moving diorama of whimsy is brutally interrupted by a home invasion and murder. It seems like an odd foot to start a film so deliberately built around magical realism, but it’s as good a segue as any to introduce the dark Miko (Elaiza Ikeda). Styled like a Japanese Emily the Strange, the 18-year-old Miko has shut herself off to the outside world since the death of her father and the disappearance of her mother when she was younger. Cared for by her maternal uncle Goro (Joe Odagiri), Miko also has the ability to see ghosts. As she moves from apartment to apartment, she ‘launders’ the haunted room by solving some of the anxieties that keep them tied to the mortal coil.
Japan’s relationship with the dead has been the focus of innumerable films, but few have been as reverentially esoteric as this. Writers Kenji Katagiri and Tatsuya Umemoto carefully construct their screenplay around a handful of archetypal characters, then spend some time giving them depth beyond the comedic surface. Case in point is deceased punk rocker Kimihiko Kasuga (Kiyohiko Shibukawa), who killed himself before ever sending his demo tape into a record company. Written primarily for laughs, he acts as a kind of Shakespearean fool by cutting through Miko’s stonewalling and is fully fleshed out (so to speak) by the film’s end. Similarly, there’s a little boy dressed in a costume with tyre tracks across his body, forever in arrested development and yearning to grow up.
All of which highlight the primary focus of Miko’s coming-of-age story. Elaiza Ikeda, who was in last year’s Tori Girl and one of several remakes of Kang Hyung-Chul Sunny, wholly embodies the pseudo-Goth persona. Completely nonplussed by the sudden appearance of the screaming ghouls, she quietly carries her own demons around, believing her mother left because of Miko’s ‘gift.’ The prolific Odagiri is a terrific foil as her loudmouthed uncle, a character who is hopelessly out of his depth but genuine as Miko’s guardian figure.
ROOM LAUNDERING builds to a surprisingly emotional apex and denouement, albeit one that still completely fits within the grim fairy tale quality of Katagiri’s narrative structure. “We’re a strange family,” Goro concedes. “But we only want what’s best for you.” More than anything, this is a story about the ties that bind, and a reminder that letting go sometimes means letting people in.
2018 | Japan | DIRECTOR: Kenji Katagiri | WRITERS: Kenji Katagiri, Tatsuya Umemoto | CAST: Elaiza Ikeda, Kentaro, Kaoru Mitsumune, Joe Odagiri, Kiyohiko Shibukawa | DISTRIBUTOR: Fantasia International Film Festival (Canada) | RUNNING TIME: 109 minutes | RELEASE DATE: 17 July 2018 (Fantasia)
