Leaving the theater, all I could think of was how sad this film it was. Kumiko is all around us; the people who hate their jobs, their bosses, the fake public faces that our lives cause us to wear. What does Kumiko do? She Takes a bedspread stolen from a hotel room and wears it like a samurai cape, as she crosses a bleak and barren American landscape in the dead of winter.
Kumiko believed in a treasure. She's suffering from depression, loneliness, and alienation. She comes to believe a piece of the movie Fargo is real. It is the culmination of all these blows to a personality that is already nearly extinguished. She must have one last shred of hope.
I laughed at various points during the film, but each time I did, I felt bad about it, as I knew there was no salvation here. Some may argue the ending does give rise to hope. I did not feel that. Kumiko may have been reborn, rising from the snow like a Phoenix, but the truth is that for so many of us, chasing a dream does not always mean your dream is fulfilled.
Kumiko believed in a treasure. She's suffering from depression, loneliness, and alienation. She comes to believe a piece of the movie Fargo is real. It is the culmination of all these blows to a personality that is already nearly extinguished. She must have one last shred of hope.
I laughed at various points during the film, but each time I did, I felt bad about it, as I knew there was no salvation here. Some may argue the ending does give rise to hope. I did not feel that. Kumiko may have been reborn, rising from the snow like a Phoenix, but the truth is that for so many of us, chasing a dream does not always mean your dream is fulfilled.