“Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman” Captures Murakami’s Soul

The work of Japanese writer Haruki Murakami can be roughly divided into two types of novels. One species is easier to film than another. The filmable variant (or rather: the most filmed books to date) is by far the most earthly. Of a melancholic love story (norwegian forest) to the enigmatic thriller (Burning) to develop a drama of mourning (drive my car): these Murakami are clearly located in a world like ours.

On the other hand, his more surreal stories are situated in universes of thought between dream and reality. Here, the characters travel through the walls, the sky is lit by two moons and the animals fulfill the role of guide. Probably the most difficult thing for the filmmakers is how Murakami portrays it all as if it were the most normal thing in the world, so that the reader gradually forgets about the unusual (see: The bird chronicles to wind up, Kafka on the beach).

Painter and filmmaker Pierre Földes (American-born to Hungarian and English parents, raised in Paris) has come up with a trick: what if a handful of Murakami’s most imaginative short stories were combined into one great animated film? Of Blind willow, sleeping woman he took on six of them, a ten-year job with which he miraculously managed to capture the soul of this unfilmable Murakami.

Blind willow, sleeping woman is conceived as a patchwork of stories which, how could it be otherwise, begins with a man waking up from a dream. It’s 2011 and Japan is reeling from the aftermath of the earthquake. Komura, barely awake, finds his lover in a trance in front of the television, enchanted by a new disaster. Another man, whom we will later know as Komura’s depressed colleague Katakiri, is shown falling asleep on the subway. At his home, Katakiri is visited by a life-size frog who gives him an important mission: a new, much more powerful earthquake seems to be happening and Katakiri has a role to play in saving Tokyo from destruction.

It’s the most important plot of a film that’s full of beautiful reflections on life in a strange, modern time. Strong is Földes’ choice to draw almost all characters that are not directly relevant as if they were transparent – ​​an expression of the prevailing feeling that they don’t really exist. Also typical: characters who tell each other stories so that the here and now is completely relegated to the background.

Blind willow, sleeping woman is a film to get lost in, with a handful of characters who all seem to live with the same elegance between sleeping and waking up.