★★★☆☆
AS opening sequences go, this certainly doesn’t hold back. We’re greeted with the brutal bludgeoning death of a man in a field, with the melancholic piano score lilting along as the killer almost casually sets the body on fire and stares into the flames. Who is he, why did he do it and what will become of him?
That’s the thrust of the plot for this compelling Japanese crime/legal thriller but it’s far from an open-and-shut case. It uses the seemingly straightforward to explore the complicated legal system and morality that is supposed to go with it, namely the controversial topic of the death penalty in a country where there have been increasing calls to banish it entirely.
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The man is Misumi (Kôji Yakusho) who, shortly after being arrested, gives a full confession. Furthermore, he has not long been released for prison for another murder he committed decades prior. Seems airtight, right? Wrong. The reality bears much more scrutiny and comes down to more than just guilty or not guilty.
Director Hirokazu Kore-eda is more interested in creating a perplexing puzzle than giving simple answers from the back of the textbook, looking at the so-called truth from many angles. Misumi’s confession is the only real evidence the investigators have, with his defence lawyer Shigemori (Masaharu Fukuyama) looking desperately for a way to get his perplexing client – brilliantly played by Yakusho as he figuratively looms over every scene of the film from behind bars – to change his story and avoid his hanging.
It marks something of a striking departure for Kore-eda from the far gentler explorations of everyday life he’s known for such as Like Father, Like Son and last year’s After The Storm. But while this may stick out from his body of work as a more distant, comparatively cold procedural, it still maintains his skill for fascinatingly studied human behaviour and keeping things far away from the melodramatic and firmly in the realm of the believable.
It may lack the in-your-face impact and paciness of many of it its genre peers but this subdued approach is entirely by design. Kore-eda skilfully makes you feel like you’re watching a genuine police investigation and subsequent court case unfold.
It’s a bold gamble for one of the most humanistic filmmakers working today that very much pays off. He has created a morally complex, thematically enthralling film that investigates with fastidious attention to everyday detail the often stark difference between how the law is set up and the meaning of true justice that lies in the eyes of the beholder.
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