KAIBUTSU / MONSTER (2023)

On the surface, Kore-eda Hirokazu’s new film shares many story & character elements with Ilker Çatak’s equally well-received THE TEACHERS’ LOUNGE/’23.  (https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2024/01/the-teachers-lounge-das-lehrerzimmer.html)  Young public school teacher watches helplessly as a small physical incident involving a troubled student rapidly escalates into a major career-threatening fiasco.  But compared to Çatak, Kore-eda is playing fourth-dimensional chess with a story structure of perplexing, yet entirely credible ‘reveals’ reversing how we thought things came about; whom we think is at fault; how the trouble started, who told the first lie; even what we think occurred.  Ideas more in line with Iranian filmmaker Asghar Farhadi (A SEPARATION/’11) and at times reminiscent of Kurosawa’s RASHOMON/’50 as we jump back to revisit scenes now told from someone else’s perspective with someone else’s ‘truth.’   Stellar directorial references there, yet Kore-eda retains a personality all his own while parsing out the difference between lies, exaggeration and honest misunderstandings without breaking a sweat . . . or our trust.  A bit too neat in giving everyone a secret to bounce off the main story (for example, the school principal lying about a personal tragedy* or the boy’s younger friend having a bully for a father to explain something the teacher is blamed for), but this ’perfect storm’ of missteps is laid out in such clear patterns, we can easily follow each tit-for-tat error in judgement.  The plot’s a puzzle, but a very human one.

DOUBLE-BILL/LINK:  In spite of the great films mentioned above, what came immediately to mind was William Wyler's classic THESE THREE/’37, also about a child’s lie that blows up to destroy lives.  https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2017/05/these-three-1936.html

SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY:  Don’t Japanese teachers have a union?  They certainly need one!  Though you can't help but wonder how much could have been avoided if the culture weren’t so rigidly polite, held down by restraint.