nick s
In Zero Focus, the Japanese director Toshitaro Nomura acclaimed in the West for 1978 film The Demon, focuses on heroine Teiko (portrayed by Yoshiko Kuga) as the personification of uncertainty in family relationships many women have to deal with.
Yoshiko Kuga is one of the most prominent actresses of the Golden Age of Japanese cinematography mainly known for her support roles. She starred as support actress in several films of Akira Kurosawa, Yasujiro Ozu, Tadashi Imai, Kenji Mizoguchi, Kinuyo Tanaka but personally, I like the most her role in Somewhere Beneath the Wide Sky by Masaki Kobayashi. Nomura and Kuga knew each other from the time of working in Kurosawa's Idiot where Nomura used to be an assistant director. In his film Zero Focus Yoshiko Kuga gets a chance to play the main role, and she does it very well.
At first glance, Zero Focus is a mystery film which tells in Rashomon-like style about the circumstances of Teiko's husband Kenichi death and past. In the first scene, he is off for a short business trip, just one week after marrying Teiko. She would never see him again, as he disappears shortly. Traveling around Japan and discovering her husband's whereabouts and details of his past life, the heroine happens to be quite a detective. Once her husband Kenichi (played by Koji Nambara) death is declared by the police, the case gets closed with no criminal record found behind his suicide. Yet Teiko is reluctant to admit the man who married her a week ago took his own life. With her discoveries, she tells the story in a very different way of learning her husband has been murdered along with two other people under peculiar circumstances. Later, while she encounters Kenichi's murder, we learn the third version of the story told by the woman who killed him.
This Rashomon-like detective story is very entertaining. There is a room for decent suspense, interesting twists of plot and jump cuts going to the past and future to show various events in different ways. The story is great, as well as acting of Yoshiko Kuga and Ineko Arima (as Hisako) who is famous for her role in the bleakest Ozu's film Tokyo Twilight.
But this is not just a detective story Toshitaro Nomuro had told. The story shows Kenichi living a double life. He lacks a strong character and attitude involving several women in his life simultaneously. They all end up suffering because of his reserved character and lie. Initially, he is afraid of breaking up with either Hisako or Emmy, but to solve his problems he involves the third woman Teiko instead of telling the truth. Not to make hard decisions, he chooses to lie again to the women and stages his death but dies as this suicide is being staged.
We learn that Teiko simply knew nothing about her husband prior to marriage. She has been passing on many offers before she chose to entrust her life to Kenichi. For the woman in Japan back in those days, the marriage has been a crucial event of all her life. However, we see that she had to take such a decision being unaware of her husband's past. She was forced to do so, and her marriage lasts for only one week. Nevertheless, as she had already entrusted her life to Kenichi she keeps investigating the details oh his death and encounters with the other women who have been hurt by Kenichi. Teiko survives, while two other women take their own lives. Teiko is trying to understand the peculiarities of all this story to look into her own life and the sad fate which is like a cold ocean on a desolate island she ruminates on at the end of the film. The dependence on marriages and men bring women to such situations where they are not protected and forced to deal with the situations with no solution.
Toshitaro Nomura comprises a suspense mystery story with psychological drama in a really good way. Zero Focus is entertaining and even magnetic. The aesthetic of the film is tailored in a traditional way of the Golden Age of cinema in Japan: with minimalistic tones, little of montage, long-takes focusing on the characters, modest visual part, it is enriched with allegories. Moreover, Zero Focus is impressive in terms of great performances of lead actress Yoshiko Kuga and Ineko Arima.
Rated 4/5 Stars •
Rated 4 out of 5 stars
03/31/23
Full Review
david f
Somewhat of a mesmerizing investigative film about a husband who disappears and all the myriad secrets that his wife discovers about him and his life when she goes looking for him. There's a wistful philosophical tone about the mysteries of the world that I liked.
Rated 2/5 Stars •
Rated 2 out of 5 stars
03/31/23
Full Review
Audience Member
An excellent mystery film. Can appropriately be called Hitchcockian in terms both of storyline and atmosphere but it also in many ways can be described as film noir. Very well photographed. A film mystery fans should definitely see.
Rated 4/5 Stars •
Rated 4 out of 5 stars
02/13/23
Full Review
Audience Member
A dark and atmospheric bit of cinematic magic.
Rated 4/5 Stars •
Rated 4 out of 5 stars
01/29/23
Full Review
walter m
In "Zero Focus, Teiko(Yoshiko Yuga) and Kenichi Uhara(Koji Nanbara) have been married for a week and they are about to settle down in Tokyo. All he has to do before formally transferring there for the ad company where he works is to meet with his successor, Honda(Takanobu Hozumi), and take care of some old business at the branch in Kanazawa. However, five days later, Kenichi has not returned and his brother Sotaro(Ko Nishimura) has not heard from him. So, the company sends Teiko and a company representative to Kanazawa but still no news until they hear from the police...
"Zero Focus" may not be the most vibrant movie ever made, but it works its methodical way in solving a compelling mystery, using a judicious use of jump editing to move around in time and memory. Underlying that mystery is a pointed critique of Japanese society, namely marriage which is necessary for any kind of respectability which seems to be only skin deep, like the advertising Kenichi works on.(On the other hand, any country where you do not need a car to get to the most remote parts cannot be all bad.) For example, there is Teiko who is forced by societal constraints to marry a man she hardly knows(to be honest, nobody seems to know much about Kenichi) or work in menial labor. However, as the movie proves as it goes on, she is a first class detective, as she works to decipher the clues surrounding her husband's disappearance.
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
03/31/23
Full Review
Audience Member
Rather interesting and clever B&W mid-Century murder mystery, even more surprising in that it hails from Japanese cinema.
Shortly after her marriage, A wife's "salaryman" heads out of town to remote prefecture of northern Japan on what is supposed to be his last bit of business with his current employer. Instead, he vanishes into thin air. The wife has to travel north to sleuth it out for herself, and it's a twisty, turny trip indeed. To say any more would spoil.
RECOMMENDATION: If you like the genre, you'll love this taste of it, garnished with wasabi.
Rated 4/5 Stars •
Rated 4 out of 5 stars
01/14/23
Full Review
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