Departures (Okuribito) is a Japanese film directed by Yojiro Takita. It won in the 81st Oscar Awards last 2009 for Best Foreign Language film. Aside from that, this film won other awards from various film festivals and the like. The film is about a former orchestra cellist, because of strange turn of events, ends up being an assistant for a certain ceremony in which I will talk about in a short while.
Daigo Kobayashi (Masahiro Motoki) is a cellist who worked in an orchestra in Tokyo. Because he lost his job after the orchestra dissolved, he decided to sell his expensive cello and along with his wife, Mika (Ryoko Hirosue) to move back into his hometown in Sakata which she agrees sweetly.
Jobless, he looks for a job in a newspaper coming from the ‘NK Agency’ that has high pay. Thinking that it is about a travel agency due to the nature of the ad saying about “departures,” he comes into the agency and seeks for the job. After a really quick interview, he receives his advance and learns the true nature of the job.
It turned out that the sign in the ad was wrong and his boss reveals that NK is the abbreviation for nōkan, in English, “encoffinment,” a ceremony about purifying and dressing up the dead before he/she will be slowly placed in his/her coffin. Learning the nature, and since he is already here, he gives the job a shot. After learning the art from his boss, and doing various jobs (His first job by the way, is regarding an two-week old corpse of an old lady), his wife learns about it (He kept secret his job on his wife) and leaves him due to the nature of his job, causing him to think thoroughly about it.
After making a resolution about his job to continue it and after a few months, his wife returned to tell him the news that she is pregnant. Later on, she accepts his job after seeing the beauty of the process. After a few other jobs, they received a telegram, telling that his estranged father, who left him when he was a child died. Will he claim his father’s corpse or will he leave it in the harbor with no one to take care of it? Will he close the issues between him and his dead father? It is for you to find out.
On to the review, when I first saw the poster of the film, I thought it is something to do about music. I was wrong. And like Daigo ending up being an assistant of an encoffinment guy (Since I don’t have the idea how to call the guy in the said profession), I ended up watching the film and it was worth it.
I have been a little interested in the business related to the dead. It is something that bothers me. Are those people working on the said business bothered with the corpses they faced everyday? The film answered it. Sure, the process of encoffinment is different from embalming since encoffinment is more in purification on the outside while embalming is about making the corpse smell… better. But seeing Daigo’s reaction when he first saw a decaying corpse gives me an impression that all people working in the business related to the dead experience it.
Aside from this, I saw how the Japanese treat the dead. They treat the dead with outmost respect and the scenes in someone’s wake was one of the touching moments of the film especially to the woman working in the bathhouse. To give you a little background about her, she doesn’t want to sell her bathhouse until she dies while her son insist in selling it to build a condominium. Her scenes in her encoffinment, till her cremation where one of the most genuine scenes in the film.
Speaking of genuine reactions, all of the clients that Daigo met have genuine reactions as they saw their dead ones being beautiful after the process. The most touching was the scene regarding to a dead homosexual and his father. They never gave much background about the family except they hinted us that the father doesn’t accept his son as he is, until the said scene happen.
About acceptance, it is one of the themes of the film, acceptance. Acceptance coming from his wife that it is his husband’s job to make those who died ready once they face the next step to their journey. In which at the end, she accepted when she saw the beauty of her husband’s job.
Lastly, accepting that whatever he did to you, he is still your father, which is what Daigo faced in the entire film. His father left him when he was young to go with a waitress that is working in their café. After learning that his father died, will he claim his body? The last scenes relating to Daigo’s father was one of the best scenes in the entire film that I cried while watching it. I am serious. I am not that emotional but the scene reminded me that my father was away most of the time back when I was a kid and we barely talk back then.
The score for the film was brilliant and it fits the entire film perfectly considering that Daigo played the cello most of the time.
The beauty about this film is the process of carefully purifying the dead. This is the highlight of the said film. It was slow, yet beautiful that you see every fine detail of the process. It was one of the unforgettable parts of the film.
Does the film have bad spots? There is a bad spot in the film. Due to the slow process of encoffinment, there is a tendency you might get bored in watching it and you tend to fall asleep, that is why the film has some minor comedic scenes.
The film is also, about what is next after we die? Although it is discussed subtly, it is one of the topics that are found in the film. When Daigo first saw a corpse in his first job, he went to the bathhouse and scrubbed everything in his body and later, went to his wife and feel her existence, that she is breathing and that she is warm. You might find that reaction kind of overrating but I find it dramatic. Another time this was discussed is when the good friend of the owner of the bathhouse speaks about what is next after we die before he cremates his good friend.
Overall, Departures is one great film. Even the film has this serious tone, it still has scenes that is funny (A sample, the scene where Daigo purifies a “female” client). The thing about Departures is that it is about acceptance, acceptance in one’s job and acceptance in one’s family. It is also about having a proper send off to your love one before he/she will meet his/her creator and the people who are behind in giving you love one a proper send off. No wonder it won an Oscar last 2009.