Written and directed by Hirokazu Koreeda, this movie carries on with his gentle, easy style of story-telling. I cannot remember the subject matter being explored by another movie, globally speaking: two boys born simultaneously in the same hospital switched in a careless mistake, with the unfortunate incident discovered six years later. The devastating impact on the two sets of parents is handled in this movie in a reflective, low key manner. In addition, it also touches on familiar issues of today that are not unique to Japan but have a global relevance: "helicopter" parents (i.e. hovering over the heads of the children incessantly), social class disparity, relationship with the older generation, just to name a few.
The two sets of parents are in two different social sectors. One comprises a middle-class go-getter corporate achiever father and a mother who came originally from a more humble a rural background but has since turned middle-class. The other set of parents is more grass-root: father a small shop owner, a handyman good at repairing broken things and the mother a fast food server well-equipped with worldly common sense. The switched kids, now 6-years-old, reflect their respective upbringing in their "adopted" (involuntarily) families. The kid brought up in the more affluent family, the only child, is introvert and somewhat timid as the result of a dominating father (and passive mother). The kid at the more grass-root family is cheerful and outgoing, due also to the fact that he has younger siblings (which nobody knew were non-blood-related until the hospital dropped the bombshell, so to speak).
From my brief description of the plot line above, one can imagine how mesmerizing a movie can be crafted. This is indeed what Hirokazu Koreeda did, in his inimitable languid style. He takes his time in developing the characters and it take some time before the audience to falls in love with the grass-rooted couple in their worldly wisdom. My earlier depiction probably painted a misleading visual picture of the grass-root mother, who is actually the prettier and younger-looking of the two. The rapport of the two mothers, mainly at her initiation, providing support to the emotionally weaker one, is quite touching. The grass-root father, who started out not too favorably, develops into quite a darling while it takes some time for the middle-class and somewhat snobbish father to turn around and become likable. The two kids are wonderful, capably projecting their respective persona as described above.
This is a movie not to be missed, particularly for the loyal followers of Hirokazu Koreeda's work, but also for anyone who enjoys the Japanese cinema at large.
The two sets of parents are in two different social sectors. One comprises a middle-class go-getter corporate achiever father and a mother who came originally from a more humble a rural background but has since turned middle-class. The other set of parents is more grass-root: father a small shop owner, a handyman good at repairing broken things and the mother a fast food server well-equipped with worldly common sense. The switched kids, now 6-years-old, reflect their respective upbringing in their "adopted" (involuntarily) families. The kid brought up in the more affluent family, the only child, is introvert and somewhat timid as the result of a dominating father (and passive mother). The kid at the more grass-root family is cheerful and outgoing, due also to the fact that he has younger siblings (which nobody knew were non-blood-related until the hospital dropped the bombshell, so to speak).
From my brief description of the plot line above, one can imagine how mesmerizing a movie can be crafted. This is indeed what Hirokazu Koreeda did, in his inimitable languid style. He takes his time in developing the characters and it take some time before the audience to falls in love with the grass-rooted couple in their worldly wisdom. My earlier depiction probably painted a misleading visual picture of the grass-root mother, who is actually the prettier and younger-looking of the two. The rapport of the two mothers, mainly at her initiation, providing support to the emotionally weaker one, is quite touching. The grass-root father, who started out not too favorably, develops into quite a darling while it takes some time for the middle-class and somewhat snobbish father to turn around and become likable. The two kids are wonderful, capably projecting their respective persona as described above.
This is a movie not to be missed, particularly for the loyal followers of Hirokazu Koreeda's work, but also for anyone who enjoys the Japanese cinema at large.