Atsumi is a manga artist. She has been in a coma for one year after a suicide attempt. The doctors say there is no medical explanation for the coma; they wonder if there is a reason why she doesn’t want to wake up.
They’ve got this high-tech equipment that lets another person enter her mind and wander around in it, so they send her boyfriend Koichi in there to find out what might be troubling her. Basically, her mind looks just like their apartment. She must be a very successful artist because the apartment has a great view and is quite spacious, especially for a place in overcrowded Japan.
As often happens in films of this kind, the cerebral tourism takes a heavy toll on both parties, but no one puts a stop it. Koichi makes visit after visit.
Real is a remarkably lifeless film. The most interesting thing about it is the concept of “philosophical zombies.” You could just as well call them visual side effects, or hallucinations, though.
Atsumi and Koichi met as children, when they lived on a lush island; they have been together ever since. Maybe familiarity breeds indifference because there is no visible chemistry between them at all, they seem like zombies themselves. (By that I mean they are slow and not very lively, there isn’t any flesh-eating going on.)
This is not Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s most engaging work.
Note to Joe Odagiri fans: his role in Real is not large enough to justify watching it.
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Real Sunday, August 3, 2014, 1:40 p.m. Concordia Hall Theatre, 1455 de Maisonneuve Blvd. W.
Japan 2013
126 minutes, Japanese with English subtitles
Director: Kiyoshi Kurosawa
Screenplay: Kiyoshi Kurosawa, Sachiko Tanaka
Cast: Takeru Sato, Haruka Ayase, Joe Odagiri, Miki Natakani
Company: TBS
