At its 2001 film release, Millennium Actress was a water hole for Satoshi Kon. Too different from the previous Perfect Blue and hindered by a little brilliant marketing, still today it is treated as a second-floor work in the sadly short filmografia of the director. Twenty-five years after the release, Anime Factory brings Millennium Actress to the cinema from 11 to 13 May: a perfect opportunity to rediscover what could be a lost masterpiece.
Millennium Actress: cinema e memoria
A documentary filmmaker and his cameraman reach Chiyoko Fujiwara, a legendary Japanese cinema diva, ready to give a first and last interview after his retirement from the scenes decades before. The woman begins to tell her story, from birth to meeting with a mysterious wanted painter who will push her to become an actress. As Chiyoko speaks, director and cameraman are dragged into the tapestry of his memory, where memories, films and imagination are intertwined together. The key to “the most important thing in the world”, which the painter leaves in Chiyoko in the 1930s and opens the door of a pursuit along a lifetime.
Un film sottovalutato
Start this review from the conclusion so that it is also clear to the distracted reader: Millennium Actress is a film that has been criminally underestimated at its time. You really deserve to be seen at the cinema: you only have three days, hurry.
Now that we have made this premise explicit, let’s talk about it.
Last of the Madhouse animated with traditional technique, Millennium Actress exploits the medium to its maximum power. The absolute control over the animated frame, released by cameras, gravity and any other bond of body reality, allows the director to tell the story of Chiyoko as a continuous trompe the experiential oeil, a vortex that before still having the appearance of memory can evoke its sensory characteristics.
Venticinque anni dopo
The comparison with the recent Resurrection is easy: two opera and operatic films, which cross a good slice of the 20th century by woven life, memory and symbolism with the history of cinema. But where Resurrection is gigantic and subcortical, Millennium Actress goes into a deeply personal direction. As and perhaps more than the rest of Kon’s films, it has the rare value of being deeply intimate without being small. But these are just words, and Millennium Actress is a film that must be heard before being explained.
Don’t let him escape, and if you just can’t, get him back. You’ll be grateful.
Il cast
Miyoko Shoji, Mami Koyama and Fumiko Orikasa play the legendary actress Chiyoko Fujiwara during the various seasons of life. Shozo Iizuka is Genya Tachibana, the director who, after admiring Chiyoko from all his life, decides to interview her for a documentary. Shouko Tsuda is Eiko Shimao, a rival diva of Chiyoko, while Hirotaka Suzuki is director Junichi Otaki, director who brings Chiyoko to fame and her first husband. Finally, Masane Tsukayama is a mysterious and cruel cop with a scar on the face that chases Chiyoko through every reality.
L’articolo Millennium actress: we rediscover the movie ignored by Satoshi Kon – The review comes from Dituttounpop.it.
