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Three-time Cannes winner Shohei Imamura's Warm Water Under a Red Bridge is, at its foundation, remarkably similar to his critically acclaimed film The Eel. Both movies deal with a middle-aged, white-collar office drone who leaves a big city life to take up with a bunch of rural kooks (and both characters are played by the great Koji Yakusho, who is probably best known in this country as the star of Shall We Dance?). But where The Eel was shockingly violent (at least at the beginning), Bridge shakes us up with several surprising sex scenes.
The whole city-to-country thing is probably meant to be a commentary on the conflict between modern Japan and that country's ancient beliefs, but since my knowledge of Japanese history is limited to the three minutes we devoted to the island nation in high school, most of it was probably lost on me. This time, the main character is Yosuke Sasano, a recently laid-off businessman who wanders the streets looking for work while his nagging wife interrupts his job hunt by ringing his cell phone and squawking about the mounting bills back home.
During his journey, Yosuke befriends a dying homeless man (Kazuo Kitamura) who tells him a story about a valuable golden Buddha statue he stole decades ago, stashing it in the home of a former girlfriend out in the sticks. With the prospect of finding work growing dimmer and dimmer, Yosuke heads out to said sticks in hopes of finding both the house (he was told it was near a red bridge) and its hidden treasure. But, in true cinematic fashion, he finds so much more.
I've witnessed many odd things happen in a small-town setting (thank you, David Lynch), but what Yosuke sees really takes the cake. He stops at a supermarket, notices a cute girl shoplifting and is surprised to see her leave behind both a puddle of water and a fish-shaped earring. Curious, Yosuke grabs the earring and carefully follows the girl home, only to find out she lives in the house by the red bridge. After meeting Saeko (Misa Shimizu), the two characters engage in an impromptu round of sex, during which we learn the origin of the titular "warm water" (and we're just as surprised as Yosuke, too).
But there's more than just the "venting" sex - most notably the colorful locals that somehow manage to never be clichéd (including an African marathoner-in-training, who is often chased by dogs, the angry words of the locals, and, sometimes, a bicycle-riding, bat-wielding coach - he can't speak English, either, which is mighty Jarmuschian) who warn Yosuke that his virility is being sapped by his new squeeze. Like fellow Asian import Suzhou River, the water here is just as important as any character, and there's even the very Vertigoish double-identity thing, since Yosuke looks just like Saeko's old boyfriend who drowned while he was fishing. Meanwhile, Yosuke takes a job as a fisherman (a la Yakusho's character's return to his blue-collar roots in The Eel - he became a barber).
Some folks might think Bridge is an extremely sexist film, especially when Yosuke graciously offers to have lots and lots of sex with Saeko if it will help to cure her shoplifting. It's actually very pro-feminism, but I can't really explain how without going into parts of the plot that I think should probably not be revealed in too much detail. Yakusho, as always, is wonderful as the long-faced sad sack (he's Kiyoshi Kurosawa's star of choice, as well) and his chemistry with Shimizu is very believable - they've appeared opposite each other in The Eel, Dance? and Imamura's previous American release, Dr. Akagi. The 76-year-old director adds plenty of his lingering static shots, while demonstrating his uncanny ability to change the mood from extreme drama to slapsticky comedy at the drop of a hat.
1:59 - R
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