I had the chance to speak with Hirokazu Kore-eda earlier this week, and we dove into the importance of building a world for his films, how to find the emotional climax of a story, and why he\u2019s so uncomfortable with strong male protagonists.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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This interview has been edited and condensed.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
There\u2019s something interesting in how Monster<\/em> is structured; in three acts, it almost feels episodic. The screenwriter, Yuji Sakamoto, has written primarily for TV. Did that shift the way you approached directing this film?<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
Many viewers of this film compare it to Akira Kurosawa\u2019s Rashomon<\/em>, and I think that might be a little bit of a mistake. But when I have seen some of Mr. Sakamoto\u2019s television series, for example, from episode one through four, it\u2019s told from the woman\u2019s perspective and then from episode five on, it\u2019s told from the man\u2019s perspective. He shifts the viewpoint that way. So when I read this script treatment, I thought, \u201cThis is similar to what he has done in television series work.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
You wrap up a lot of the thematic threads in the third act and that\u2019s where you land the emotional moments, too. When you\u2019re directing, how do you know it\u2019s the right time to land that emotional punch for the viewer?<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
When I read the script, I thought that the emotional climax was in the music room where the principal and protagonist play music together. But then as I shot the film, this wasn\u2019t really in the script. There is a time when the mother and the teacher are looking for the boys and they\u2019re wiping away the mud on the abandoned train car. So I thought that was another very cinematic way of showing the climax from the adults\u2019 point of view. As I\u2019m shooting the film, I sometimes discover where an emotional scene might be. And I do that while I\u2019m shooting it on-site, so to speak, to find that meaning.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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It\u2019s that first moment in the third act where Yori Hoshikawa (Hinata Hiiragi) is being bullied and Minato Mugino (Soya Kurokawa) comes to his aid. That\u2019s where I felt it first. And then everything after that is equally devastating.<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
As I read the plot treatment initially, of course, it was very interesting and I saw that Mr. Sakamoto clearly showed what he meant and that what was really important was the children\u2019s world that they had created. So I put all my energy in trying to create that world of the children.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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The characters in Monster<\/em> \u2014 young and old \u2014 all share this conflicted feeling of shame. When you were working on set with these actors, did you find yourself giving different types of direction to embody that emotion?<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
The actors who played the teacher and the principal are long in the stable of actors who have played in Mr. Sakamoto\u2019s television dramas. So they really know what he\u2019s trying to express and how to express it. They knew much better than I about how to do that, so I wasn\u2019t fretting about that. They already had the answers within them.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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For the children, for the boys, I repeatedly told them, \u201cDon\u2019t show your emotion. Show what you are hiding. Think about what you don\u2019t want other people to know about you and how you would act in that way.\u201d That\u2019s what I told them to do. I think they did a very good job of doing that.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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For the children, for the boys, I repeatedly told them, \u201cDon\u2019t show your emotion. Show what you are hiding.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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A lot of your films, for me, have felt queer in nature \u2014 if not in story. Monster<\/em> felt like one of your more direct attempts at navigating that discourse. Can you talk about how you went about approaching that?<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
When you say you thought that my films are queer in nature, what aspect do you mean? How did you feel that?<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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When I think about American films that I\u2019ve seen; there\u2019s this performance of masculinity that feels toxic. But across your work, for example in Broker<\/em>, Shoplifters<\/em>, Nobody Knows<\/em> \u2014 there\u2019s this softness to all the characters. They feel human.<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
I think you\u2019re asking how I see human relationships and you mentioned the strong male figure in American films, but that\u2019s not something I experienced. That\u2019s not what I grew up with. So it\u2019s very hard for me to identify with a strong male type figure, and I really don\u2019t feel comfortable with a strong male protagonist. So that\u2019s probably why they don\u2019t appear.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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