Review of Blue Spring (2001) by Bill B — 19 Sep 2014

Toyoda's bleak, fierce and rebellious essay about high-school youth is one stylish delivery that marks Toyoda's comeback to straightforward moviemaking after a documentary effort.

Maybe the first concern that people will face when stumbling upon this underknown gem is the suspension of disbelief it requires for buying this hypothetically anarchich high-school environment, where teachers are unrealistically permissive and even run away from the students for their own safety, where there is not enough security looking after the crimes committed in this space, where "education" seems to be ridiculously banal. But remember: it is surreal. All essays dealing with contemporary problems (not only about youth, but about any topic of social relevance) can allow themselves to be unrealistic and unconventional sometimes to deliver a message in a stronger way.

So remember, it is a surreal examination of a hypothetically anarchic environment and, moreover, it is based on a manga. I found about the latter after finishing the film, but indeed, while I was watching it (and ergo before I knew it was based on a manga), I wondered how this would have come across or received if made in anime form. It has all the bizarre trademarks for bringing a realistic setting unrealistically, so imagining this as an anime feature, with its potential success, is not hard at all. So why am I using the word "hypothetically" too much? Because of the "suppose that..." game we are invited to play:

Suppose that we take the real problems of youth nowadays and transmit them to a school. Suppose, however, that adults don't matter, students are not asked to be disciplined pervasively enough, and internal security is not existent. To what extent, therefore, could the behavioral tendencies of youth evolve if given more liberties, that is, if granted more permissions? Toyoda directs this violent and weird hypothesis about a possible answer, which can be interpreted either as a wake-up call for both young and adult generations (their parents), or as a symbolic tale about any oppressive form of government, where rulers are worshipped and followed with fundamentalist loyalty, and base their ruling period with an iron-fist type of imposition. Of course, the internal conflicts are not excluded, including a follower that decides to rebel against the present ruler for overthrowing him.

The fantastic final act convinced me of the final rating, where we learn that everything that cannot blossom is destined to remain dead, as in a flower. We learn this reflection from the only adult that actually has a relevance plotwise... and this adult happens to be a dwarf. But does this rule apply deterministically against humanity as well? Or is a human being capable of changing? Can light be originated in the middle of darkness?

97/100.

P.S. It is impactful the degree to which the film manages that you care about the characters each new minute. That's something hard to achieve.