Art & Entertainment

The Japanese Wife

Aparna Sen’s adaptation of the Kunal Basu story is engaging and emotive only in parts and not profound enough to linger on in your mind.

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The Japanese Wife
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Starring: Rahul Bose, Chigasu Takaku, Raima Sen
Directed by Aparna Sen
Rating:

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The Japanese Wife is about a long-distance marriage between two introverts—Snehamoy (Bose) in remote Sunderbans and Miyage (Takaku) in faraway Japan—that is sustained on a continuous exchange of letters and a few phone calls. Such a seemingly implausible tale of unconsummated yet bottom-less love between two inhibited individuals, who’ve never set eyes on each other, could have made for an intensely romantic film. However, Aparna Sen’s adaptation of the Kunal Basu story is engaging and emotive only in parts and not profound enough to linger on in your mind.

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Sen crafts her tale well. The lush visuals and overpowering landscape become characters in their own right. Then there are some standout whimsical moments. Some underlined with a genteel humour, like  Miyage sending a Polaroid camera to Snehamoy with the rider that she couldn’t find a Bengali manual for it in Japan. Or the rousing sequence when Japanese kites are flown high in the Bengal skies by Snehamoy, as if to show how far his love can fly. However, these quixotic touches are not knit together well; the narrative lacks fluidity and moves in fits and spurts. The stilted dialogues and rehearsed accents are a let-down.

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Some of the characters on the side are more real and interesting, be it the caustic aunt (Moushumi’s flashy reappearance) or the quaint ayurvedic medicine man. Things do suddenly light up when Sandhya (the Bengali girl Snehamoy refused to marry) comes back as a widow to stay in his house. It’s their relationship, fuelled initially on some stolen glances, that feels far more beguiling than the cross-country marriage. You can see how it’s growing to take a meaning and significance of its own. Especially endearing is the scene where Sandhya shifts some of the dishes from her lunch plate to that of Snehamoy’s. She does it with an easy sense of ownership and possessiveness of a woman in love. It’s this real relationship, constantly kept in denial, that has far more possibilities than the mundane and dull one unfolding through the letters. Unfortunately, it doesn’t get the cinematic exploration it deserves. Nor does Raima, who is simple, self-assured but luminous as Sandhya.

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Courtesy: Film Information

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