Our next step has been confirmed and we will leave KL in the coming months. The city has become a sort of home, and life here has become life rather than an interlude. This was brought home at our celebratory dinner last night at Sushi Azabu where the staff recognised us and greeted us as old friends, and Sato-san, who is our favourite sushi chef there, made us a few special bits and pieces including an arc clam roll with shiso instead of the usual preserved wintermelon.
Kubo and the Two Strings had been on our list for a long time and we finally watched it. It was very beautiful, exceptionally so for stop motion which I sometimes find a little revolting. Some of the dialogue was very funny, particularly the scenes in the whale belly. But there was also some very clunky dialogue, particularly when lessons were being taught, and some overplayed humour. I didn’t care for the ending which felt a bit ‘but it’s all all right in the end, eh?’.
I’m rather unsure about the film itself. There is something about Western Japanophilia that is unsettling, and this cartoon, made with only 1-2 Japanese names in the credits, seemed rife with it. It was beautifully done, but still felt a bit fetishistic, perhaps because of those didactic moments which appeared to come from an American sensibility, not a Japanese one, and so took me out of the film. At the same time, from what I can tell it had a good reception in Japan, so who am I to say?
I did find the scenes showing a character’s brain damage painful and daring, though again it all came right in the end (or at least after the desired effect had been achieved) which is not how it usually works out.