Much like the similarly dead and buried Bronco Henry in The Power of the Dog, the deceased Junpei lingers over writer/director Hirokazu Kore-eda's Still Walking without ever strolling into a single frame of footage. Audiences don't need to see flashbacks to happier days when the Yokoyama family included a living and breathing Junpei. This family’s chilly dynamic effectively signals that everyone is still mourning. Ryota (Hiroshi Abe) and Chinami's (You) oldest brother has been gone for 12 years as Still Walking begins. Yet his prized possessions still linger in his parent's house. Father Kyohei (Yoshio Harada) is still aloof with everyone in the family, especially the surviving son Ryota. These are the qualities that make Junpei emotionally tangible without ever physically appearing on-screen.
These challenging familial struggles are more apparent than ever during the family's annual gathering to mourn Junpei's loss. This is the single day Kore-eda's screenplay almost exclusively focuses on. He and cinematographer Yutaka Yamasaki keep the camera focused on mundane corners of this event like Chinami and elderly mom Toshiko (Kirin Kiki) getting everything ready for imminently arriving guests. Ryota and Kyohei’s fractured dynamic is also on clear display, while Ryota and his new wife Yukari (Yui Natsukawa) grapple with the former character's parents disapproving of their union. Yukari is a widow with a young son, Atsushi (Shohei Tanaka). Having their son marry a woman like that is seen as deplorable in Toshiko and Kyohei's eyes.
Junpei brings this extended family together one day a year. Still Walking, though, paints a realistically clear picture of what keeps the Yokoyama family apart. Nearly every line traded between members of this family are curt remarks about physical or emotional shortcomings. There’s so much pain bottled up in these souls, especially with Toshiko and Kyohei. Yet there are also fascinating nuances here between characters. Particularly compelling are the varying approaches to Atsushi from his newly minted grandparents. Toshiko is aloof to Atsushi, right down to bidding him farewell with a handshake. It’s a pattern of detached behavior that poor Yukari notices right away and even brings up to her spouse.
Intriguingly, though, Atsushi is the only relative Kyohei opens up to during this familial gathering. Everyone else just elicits a disapproving grunt from this elderly doctor. Atsushi, though, inspires Kyohei to ask the kid questions about his occupational ambitions and personal life. There could be a selfish element here related to Kyohei seeking out a “replacement” for Junpei. But there is also something sweet to his genuine caring for Atsushi. The drastic shift in interest towards this youngster between Kyohei and Toshiko is remarkably compelling. Impressively, Kore-eda realizes this contrast without upsetting Still Walking’s transfixing understated aura. There’s so much spoken in this captivating feature just through little pieces of physicality or blocking!
Visually, Still Walking also reminded me, of all things, of the ludicrousness of digital 3D. When executives were thumping the drum for this gimmick, the likes of Jeffrey Katzenberg would proclaim to the heavens that, because of digital 3D, depth in movies would FINALLY be properly conveyed. It would require you to wear sunglasses indoors and watch movies with inherently dimmer lighting, but the depth! The depth! Because my brain is rotten from the inside out, I was reminded of those comments in quiet tender scenes where Toshiko and Ryota’s family visit Junpei’s grave.
This location is on a hillside overlooking a slew of buildings and a distant beach. Various discernible layers of urban life occupy the backdrop. As this quartet of characters shares a moment of profound intimacy with Junpei’s tombstone, viewers constantly recognize the larger external world. Like any instance of Orson Welles deploying depth of field in Citizen Kane years ago, Kore-eda and Yamasaki make space deeply tangible in this Still Walking sequence. I could feel in my bones how much these souls were dwarfed by the surrounding city, a physical parallel to the emotional problems overwhelming the Yokoyama family. You don’t need glasses and super-charged ticket prices to grasp this shot’s scope. Masterful directors and cinematographers can convey those qualities at the drop of a hat.
Still Walking’s filmmaking also excels with simpler, more contained interior imagery. Especially unforgettable is a tight image capturing Toshiko in a side profile shot as she explains to Ryota why she forces Yoshio to attend this annual mourning for Junpei. She holds Yoshio responsible for this death and finds fleeting solace in, one day a year, holding this 25-year-old in seething contempt. Framing this shot from the side accentuates the idea that viewers are seeing a corner of Toshiko’s personality that doesn’t dominate her everyday demeanor. These are the darkest nooks and crannies of her psyche externally represented just by the position of the camera. It’s a striking way to capture this moment executed with a masterfully haunting performance from Kirin Kiki.
Similarly impactful in restrained intimate visuals is a shot of just Yukari as she talks to an off-screen Toshiko. The latter character says something incredibly cruel about Yukari and that inspires Ryoto’s wife to do…nothing. In an elongated unblinking shot, we see Yukari process this remark without ever breaking her smile or warm demeanor. Yui Natsukawa’s facial acting here is tremendous, there’s no other word for it. While conveying Yukari maintains her composure, she still subtly conveys this woman’s internal pain. Affection from her mother-in-law is always elusive and Natsukawa delicately communicates the toll that has on Yukari. The commitment to such an uninterrupted image, meanwhile, lets the awkwardness and turmoil of this exchange linger uncomfortably in the air.
Top-notch imagery and performances abound in Still Walking, a movie best described as heart-breaking. Here is a family so deeply soaked in 12 years of pain that their strife is communicated to each other in such subtle yet devastating terms. Conflict is now their default rapport while everyone is looking to exploit one another. Caked-in pain radiates off the Yokoyama family and it’s mesmerizing to witness Hirokazu Kore-eda chronicle a day in that reality. Equally absorbing are more upbeat departures from that aesthetic, like Atsushi and Yukari's warmer dynamic or the former character going outside at night to talk to his deceased birth father. Complicated familial dynamics define Kore-eda’s iconic work. Just look at his 2018 masterpiece Shoplifters. Still Walking crystallizes why he’s so adept at navigating this thorny and raw material.