Tatsumi
Tatsumi
Singapore, 2011, colour/b&w, 1.85:1, 95 mins.
Director: Qiu Jinhai 邱金海 [Eric Khoo].
Rating: 5/10.
Interesting documentary curio about manga artist Tatsumi Yoshihiro is devoid of real passion.
STORY
A biographical tribute to Japanese manga artist Tatsumi Yoshihiro 辰巳嘉裕 (b. 1935), who in 1957 founded the dramatic, more adult and realistic gekiga 剧画 style that found general acceptance in the 1970s. Illustrated with animated excerpts from five of his short stories: Hell 地狱, about military photographer Koyanagi who becomes famous for his picture of two Hiroshima victims but then discovers the truth behind it; Beloved Monkey いとしのモンキー, about an injured factory worker and his pet monkey; Just a Man 男 一発, about a soon-to-retire man who decides to blow his savings on the beautiful Miss Ozawa but can’t get a hard-on when necessary; Occupied はいってます, about a writer of children’s books who turns to drawing erotic graffiti in public toilets; and Good-Bye グッドバイ, about Mariko, a prostitute serving US soldiers who takes a dramatic decision.
REVIEW
A tribute by Singapore director Qiu Jinhai 邱金海 [Eric Khoo] to his hero, Japanese manga artist Tatsumi Yoshihiro 辰巳嘉裕, Tatsumi is an interesting curiosity devoid of any real passion or personal sense of discovery. Emotionally level from start to finish, and largely made up of animated excerpts from five of Tatsumi’s short mangas, it’s a film-maker’s personal tribute without any personality at all. That said, for those unacquainted with Tatsumi’s work the movie is generally interesting and sometimes fascinating – especially as Tatsumi’s works have never been adapted for either the big or small screens – and at only 95 minutes doesn’t overstay its welcome.
At least in Qiu’s selection, Tatsumi’s bleak view of the world and human nature, especially its impotency-fraught sexual side, does become a tad repetitive in his simple, bleak, pen drawings – which Phil Mitchell, executive creative director at Singapore-based CG/animation house Infinite Frameworks has faithfully brought to life in basic 2-D animation. This so-called gekiga 剧画 more realist style that Tatsumi pioneered in the late 1950s appears to have been his biggest contribution to the manga genre. Unwisely, Qiu puts the strongest of his selection – Hell 地狱, an out-of-this-world, Hiroshima-set whodunit – at the very front, making the other four seem pale in comparison. The biographical side of the film, interwoven between the short-story excerpts, is pretty perfunctory, as well as a little confusing in the way it’s edited in the opening minutes. [Qiu based his script on Tatsumi’s autobiography A Drifting Life 剧画漂流, serialised 1995-2006 and published in 2008.]
Tatsumi himself provides voice-overs for the biographical segments – and at the age of 75 claims, “I still have many worlds I want to draw” – while Japanese actor Bessho Tetsuya 別所哲也 provides voices for the animated sequences. The majority of the latter, apart from Occupied, are in b&w. [Tatsumi died on 7 Mar 2015, aged 79.]
CREDITS
Presented by Zhao Wei Films (SG).
Script: Qiu Jinhai [Eric Khoo]. Manga: Tatsumi Yoshihiro. Music: Qiu Zhengliang [Christopher Khoo], Cen Shiting [Christine Sham]. Art direction: Widhi Saputro. Sound: Sato Kazuo [Kazz Sato], Warren Santiago. Creative animation: Phil Mitchell. Animation supervision: Rafael Bonifacio, Jebbie Barrios.
Voices: Bessho Tetsuya, Tatsumi Yoshihiro.
Premiere: Cannes Film Festival (Un Certain Regard), 17 May 2011.
Release: Singapore, 15 Sep 2011.
(Review originally published on Film Business Asia, 2 Jun 2011.)