Acclaimed Japanese director Kiyoshi Kurosawa departs from the horror genre for this mystical story of urban ennui. Friends Mamoru (Tadanobu Asano) and Yuji (Joe Odagiri) are aimless young men stuck in dead-end jobs in a dreary factory in Tokyo. Mamoru, the more antisocial of the two, is obsessed with his pet project of acclimating a poisonous jellyfish to fresh water by gradually changing the water in its tank. One night, he inexplicably murders his boss' family and is sentenced to death. Yuji,
left to continue the jellyfish experiment, befriends Mamoru's estranged father, and the two form a bond that helps him overcome his emotional troubles. But his attachment to the jellyfish is even stronger, and problems arise when he accidentally releases the poisonous creature into the canals of Tokyo. ~ Tom Vick, Rovi
The most spellbinding aspect of Bright Future is that the surrealism sustains its own squiddish logic, concluding with one of the most breathtaking film finales of the year.
Directed by Kiyoshi Kurosawa, a prolific and sui generis talent from Japan, this quietly creepy film contains a hint of politics and a wealth of shivers.
The writer-director's story sense is far too distracted, clouding the film's themes and even its basic plotline and allowing only the most glancing insights into its characters.
Bright Future can be off-putting -- neither of the two protagonists attempt to engage the camera, and more woe is expended on mourning Mamoru than considering his victims.
No stranger to the bizarro social metaphor, [Kurosawa] somehow paints the film's title as honestly optimistic, winkingly ironic, and completely doom-laden at the same time.
In "Bright Future", Mamoru(Tadanobu Asano) and Yuji(Jo Odagiri) are two friends who work in a factory in Tokyo to maintain their slacker lifestyles. Yuji prefers to spend his spare time asleep when he dreams of utopias. When he is not asleep, he goes bowling or to the arcade. Mamoru keeps a red jellyfish as a pet which
is poisonous. After being offered permanent positions with the company, they become friendly with their boss."Bright Future" starts out creepy before its eccentricities just make it annoying. There is little idea as to what motivates the characters. The film might be a statement about the aimlessness of youth but that does not explain the significance of the jellyfish.
January 27, 2006
Walter M.
Super Reviewer
Japanese fillm about two solitary friends and, initially at least, a jellyfish. Even after watching the whole thing quite carefully, I'm not really sure what the film's trying to say. There's a plot, and action, character development, it's intriguing, and very lovely in places and .... hmm, still no.
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