"Moonchild" is one of my personal favorite movies. It is a Science-fiction (sci-fi) Japanese movie produced in around 2002. The movie is revolves around the main character, Sho, during his years at Mallepa, a city with refugees from mainly Korea, Japan and Taiwan.
The prologue of the movie talks of a disaster that befell Japan and therefore, many citizens run to Mallepa to seek refuge. However, Mallepa is not exactly a safe city with gangsters, criminals and even vampires all living there.
Young Sho and his two best friends, Toshi and Shinji, are orphans who steal from rich people to survive. The story goes that they stole from a rich Taiwanese gangster who chased after them and attempted to shoot the children. But a vampire, Kei, stopped the gangster by feeding on his blood - an act that appalled Shinji and Toshi. Only Sho wasn't afraid of Kei, and that was the start of a blossoming friendship between human and vampire.
Fast forward perhaps a decade later, Sho and Kei were robbing a Taiwanese gang hide-out when they met a Taiwanese man named Sun who was there to kill the head of the gang for raping his younger sister. Hereon, friendship blossomed among the three men.
As they grow older, things began to change. Sun joined a Taiwanese gang whose boss later on killed Shinji and angered Sho greatly, while Kei was discovered to be a vampire and arrested, and Sho became a Japanese mafia. Needless to say, Sho and Sun became further and further apart.
As Sho plotted his revenge on the Taiwanese mafia, he enlisted the help of Kei who broke out of prison to rush to Sho's aid. The face-off between the Japanese and Taiwanese thus began!
At the very end of battle, it was Sho and Sun who faced off as the Taiwanese mafia had died beforehand due to two traitors in his gang and Kei was having his own problems in reaching where Sho was as he could not be in direct contact with the sun. As Sho and Sun faced each other, both having only one bullet left in their guns, they decided to shoot each other with that last bullet. And the survivor would take care of Hana, the daughter of Sho and Yi-Che (Sun's younger sister). And so, they counted aloud "1. 2. 3." On the count of "3", they would fire.
However, Sho didn't press the trigger as they promised. And Sun watched in horror as Sho fell to the ground, and asked "Why didn't you shoot as we promised?" but was only replied with a weak smile by Sho. At that time, Kei appeared and stared in horror as his best friend lay on the ground dying with Sun looking at him, gun in hand. And Kei killed Sun in that very instant.
The scene ended there, with the viewers' thinking that Sho had died, but Kei saved him. By turning Sho into a vampire too. And as the two best friends lived on Earth, Kei looking after Hana with Sho watching secretly in the shadows (he did not want Hana to know that he turned into a vampire), they longed to be with their friends again. They longed to return to the past and experience those happy times again.
And so, Sho and Kei sat in a car watching the sunrise at the beach, allowing the sunlight to burn them. And the movie ended as they showed the empty car that contained two beings a while ago.
What I like about the movie is that it talks about friendship. Even though throughout the movie there was plenty of fighting and lawlessness, the bond among Toshi, Kei, Sun and Sho was very prevalent. One could perhaps even liken that bond to a firework in the dark sky - beautiful and bright in contrast to the dark, gloomy surroundings.
I cried during the scene where Sho was fatally shot by Sun, because the moment when Sun asked "Why didn't you shoot as we promised?" and Sho only replied with a smile, I realized how much Sho valued the bond between he and Sun. So much that he could not bear to shoot his dear friend.
First photo
Second photo
At the very end of the movie, they show the friends running around and posing for a group shot, similar to the one they took before. That very last scene burned in my mind. That photo was nolstagic. The very first one they took was before circumstances changed, while the second one was taken after they were reincarnated. It made me smile at them for being able to return to the past, for being able to be as close as they were once again.
To be able to return to the past and enjoy those times again with the ones you cherish are wishes that humans always harbor. When relationships go wrong, we always wish that we can go back to how we were and enjoy those happy times, yet knowing that those times will probably never return. Therefore, to me, that last scene where the group of friends were as close as they originally were was like a wish that came true to me. Even though perhaps it will never happen in my life, but the movie made that wish come true for me as I sat there watching and weeping over the incidents that caused their relationships to change.
And even though I weeped tears at the end of the movie, those tears can be considered "tears of joy" at the reunion of the group of friends who cherish each other deeply.
Done by Cheong Yue Seng
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Wednesday, December 31, 2008
Recently, I read the story "Totto-chan". The story is a short autobiography of the author's, Kuroyanagi Tetsuko, childhood and a tribute to the headmaster, Kobayashi Sosaku, of her elementary school.
The story talks of the values and the teaching system of Tomoe, the elementary school Totto-chan studied in. The teaching system in Tomoe is vastly different from society then and even now, and it gave the students the freedom to choose which subject they wanted to study first. The headmaster, Kobayashi Sosaku, was a man who studied eurythmics under Emile Jaques-Dalcroze in Paris and he implemented eurythmics in his style of teaching at Tomoe. Even through the immense fun that the students experienced while studying in Tomoe, they brought home more than fun but also lessons that benefitted them later on as they grew up to be adults.
In fact, studying at Tomoe was so fun that none of the students wanted to go home after school! They wanted to stay back in school and enjoy the lessons at Tomoe.
The friendship and bond that the children made during their years in Tomoe never diminished even though the school was burned down during World War 2. For years, even when they are now in their 40s and some reaching their 50s, they still meet annually and reminisce about the time in Tomoe and about their headmaster and his methods of teaching that groomed them to be the people they are today.
As I read the book, the fun, laughter and even sad times in the book brought tears to my eyes. It was like I, too, was a student at Tomoe and I really experienced such wonderful times there even though in reality I wasn't born yet. Experiencing what Totto-chan experienced in the book felt a little nolstagic, yet it brought about a tiny pinch of envy and dissentment with the system in Singapore. I wished I was like Totto-chan, blessed with such a wonderful headmaster and such fun and enjoyable ways of studying. Perhaps, if every educator was like Kobayashi Sosaku, students would enjoy studying and be more motivated. Kobayshi Sosaku never condemned any one of his students, but in his own way, nurtured and encouraged them to do what they liked, to chase after their dream. And he even helped them to chase their dream during their time in Tomoe.
Indeed, in the epilogue of the book, author Kuroyanagi Tetsuko contacted her classmates from Tomoe and wrote down what her classmates are doing in this present age. And many, if not all, attributed their social standing now to their headmaster, the founder of Tomoe, Kobayashi Sosaku.
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