映画の海で歩く

The Sea in Film, and Its Meaning

When the project "Visiting the Sea from the Film, on Foot" first got underway, the first film with a memorable sea that came to mind was blue (2003), directed by Hiroshi Ando.

The film blue is based on the manga of the same name by Kiriko Nananan. I first saw it more than twenty years ago, but I clearly remember one scene: two high school girls who had skipped class sitting side by side on the beach, talking as they gazed out at the sea. A scene like that, whether in manga or in film, is probably fairly common. And yet blue had a texture somehow different from other works. It was something like — how should I put it — the feeling of a person simply "being there," in a place called the sea.

I watched the film again for the first time in a long while. That feeling of "simply being there" was still there, unchanged. But what does it actually mean to "simply be there"? What kind of place is the sea, in those moments? Or rather, what kind of "meaning" does the sea present itself to us as...? As I walk the seas of film, these are the things I wanted to think about.

Visiting Niigata

The day I visited Niigata, the sky was heavy and overcast — weather that felt a little like the sea scene in the film. Near Niigata Station, in a corner lined with restaurants and business hotels, I rented a car from a parking lot. For the time being, I drove west, toward the sea.

Niigata is the main filming location for blue, and also the hometown of the manga's original author, Kiriko Nananan. For now, I set my destination as a place called "Yotsugouyahama." It seemed the sea scenes in the film had been shot somewhere around there.

As I got closer to the sea, houses disappeared, and the scenery grew increasingly desolate. Driving along the road running parallel to the coastline, I kept an eye out for any scenery that looked familiar. Thick clusters of trees lined the roadside, and the view remained largely unchanged for a while.

What served as a landmark was a single curved traffic mirror. From there, a road continued on toward the coast. I drove past it once, but after making a U-turn and going back, I confirmed it was indeed a spot that appeared repeatedly in the film — a road with a wooden fence on the right, leading straight toward the sea, its grassy tire tracks striking a memorable green.

Early in the film, the protagonist, high school student Kayako Kirishima, spots her classmate Masami Endo getting off the school bus partway through her commute and walking toward the sea. Endo is a year older, though in the same grade, and has a past that includes some kind of suspension from school. The two gradually grow close, and Endo takes Kirishima to the sea. This is the very path they walk along. At the end of the road stretched a sea of dull, grayish blue. The two sit side by side on the sand, and Endo speaks to Kirishima.

"Sometimes I'd come here on my way home, just to kill time... when school ended and I didn’t want to go home, and there was nowhere else to go.”

The Road That Leads to the Sea in the Film

I got out of the car and headed toward the road leading to the sea that had appeared in the film. The grass had grown quite thick, but the curved traffic mirror — the very one that had stood out so memorably in the film — was still there, so there was no mistaking this was the place. Feeling reassured all over again, I pressed forward, only to find something blocking the path: a barrier resembling a small railroad crossing gate. A sheet had been attached to the bar, with lettering so faded you could almost see through to the other side, reading "No Entry."

"What on earth?" I thought. Coming all the way to Niigata, finding the actual filming location — and then discovering I couldn't go in — was a scenario I hadn't imagined. And this was still just the road, not even the sea itself. No matter how many times I looked, the barricade clearly read "No Entry." There was simply no way to reach the sea from here. I couldn't follow the route from the film.

With no other option, I settled for taking a photo of the spot on my iPhone. And then I got to thinking. Film is fiction, after all.

Even in blue, while the main filming locations were in Niigata, the school scenes were apparently shot in Toyama Prefecture. Editing simply made it look like the same place. This very road, too, has a bus stop in the film — yet no such thing exists here now. It was probably built as a set piece by the art department. That's simply the nature of fiction.

So perhaps what lies at the end of this road isn't actually the sea from the film at all. Perhaps it was really just footage shot somewhere else entirely, stitched together through editing. If I walked to the end of the road, I would surely find out the truth. But as long as it says "No Entry," there's no way to confirm it. And so — for those of us who have seen blue — this road will simply go on being the road that leads to the sea of the film... or so I found myself reasoning, in a bit of a stretch of logic.

A "blue" Kind of Feeling

I tried visiting a few nearby beaches, but none of them seemed to be the sea from the film. With nowhere left to go, I finally headed to Yotsugouyahama — the place I'd set as my rough destination at the very start, a little way off from that "road" I'd found earlier.

The building of a now-defunct inn still remained there. I parked the car beside it, in front of what looked like a now-unused rest area. It seemed possible that this place had once, long ago, been a fairly popular spot for sea bathing. On the not-especially-wide stretch of sand, a few children were playing.

This, too, turned out to be a different place from the sea in the film. I sat on the edge of the seawall, gazing absently out at the water, and spent some time simply listening to the sound of the waves. The wind was strong, but it felt good. With nothing in particular to do, I had the sense of simply "being there." Even though it wasn't the actual filming location, there was a faint touch of that "blue" kind of feeling.

One way or another, I must have stayed like that for about an hour. The sun was already beginning to set, and the children who had been playing earlier had disappeared without my noticing. It was starting to get a little cold. I decided it was about time to head back.

A Sealed Room Called the Beach

I got into the car and started the engine. I stepped on the gas. The car moved for a brief moment, then stopped. Had it caught on something? I stepped on the gas again. I could hear the tires spinning, but the car wouldn't move. I got out of the driver's seat to check. It seemed the wheels had sunk into the sand and were just spinning uselessly. So this was what people meant by getting "stuck." I'd heard about it before, but this was my first time experiencing it.

Was there any way to fix this? I searched around for solutions. I'd read that pouring water on the sand could help harden it, so I tried using what was left in my plastic bottle, but that small amount had no effect at all. I struggled with it every way I could think of, but eventually realized it was hopeless. I called the rental car company and explained the situation; they said they would arrange a tow truck, so I waited for their call back.

By now it was nearly night. There wasn't a single streetlight anywhere around. I gradually began to feel uneasy. The phone rang. The signal was weak, so the call kept cutting in and out. According to the person from the towing company, "It'll take about an hour to get there." An hour, waiting in a place like this? Within walking distance, there wasn't even a convenience store or a vending machine — let alone a house.

The sea, which just moments ago I had found so pleasant to sit beside, now seemed to close in on me like something frightening. Even though there was nothing around blocking my view in any direction, I suddenly felt as if I'd been shut inside a sealed room. As long as I'd been able to leave whenever I wanted, I had been able to "simply be there." But the moment the car stopped moving and I was stranded by the sea, I could no longer "simply be there." Being able to "simply be there" had only been possible because I could also "not be there."

In any case, there was nothing to do but wait. Suddenly, it started to rain. Adding insult to injury, I took shelter in the car and, listening to the rain pounding down hard, simply waited for the tow truck to arrive. To take my mind off things, I put on the soundtrack to blue.

Music That Simply Plays,
and Interactive Media

In the sea and beach scenes of blue, there is a moment where a recorder plays a melody line. That melody is not only simple, but has an atmosphere that barely feels like "music" at all — almost as if it were nothing more than someone "practicing." Listening to the soundtrack, the sounds it weaves together capture, quite fittingly, the fragility of the sea scene in the film, and of the two people present within it.

The music was composed by Yoshihide Otomo, who would later become widely known for scores such as the one for Amachan. In one interview, he said the following:

"Broadly speaking, films and dramas have scenes where the story pushes strongly forward, and scenes where the story doesn't move forward — where, rather than progressing, things 'simply exist there,' scenes where nothing much develops. …… Just as the sea doesn't say anything but still exists, I felt the music needed that same quality of just playing, simply being there. I was conscious of a feeling that had nothing to do with the story's progression — the sense that 'no matter what happens, the sea is just there.'" ^*1

The phrase "just playing, simply being there," described here, captures the film's music remarkably precisely. Expressions like "simply exist there" and "no matter what happens, the sea is just there" also feel perfectly suited to blue, a film built on quiet visuals and sound.

Film critic Yasuhito Higuchi, discussing Otomo's film scores, has pointed out that Otomo was influenced by the films of Godard, writing the following:

"In essence, film is something fleeting and faint that only truly comes into being once it is seen by someone. …… What Yoshihide Otomo learned from Godard is, I believe, precisely this way of being a film — that is, music that barely comes into being through being heard by someone. That is why that sound becomes something visible." ^*2

Higuchi, also known as the organizer of the "Bakuon Film Festival," where films are screened at high volume using live-music equipment, defines film as a "thoroughly interactive medium." Rather than a one-way flow of audiovisual information, it is a "relationship" born between the screen and the audience.

The music Otomo creates, with its quality of "just playing," never directly explains a character's inner state or the story itself. But precisely because of that, it requires the audience's gaze. In scenes where "the story doesn't move forward," this music makes it possible for the people on screen to "simply be there." That is because the sound he creates is "music that barely comes into being through being heard by someone." The audience listens closely, and in a way separate from simply following the story, re-forges a "relationship" between their eyes and the screen.

If It Isn't Seen, It Doesn't Exist

The sea carries a flow of time that permits us to "simply be there." To "simply be there" means putting off, for the time being, the choice to leave, opening our bodies to the sound and motion of the waves, the feel of the wind and sand, and continuing to remain in that place.

Within this lies an asymmetrical relationship between the sea, which continues to exist "no matter what," and us, who do not exist in that same way. The sea does not respond to us. The movement of its waves does not change according to our will. And so, rather than trying to accomplish something toward the sea, we have no choice but to simply place ourselves before it.

And in such moments, our perception, precisely by becoming passive, grows sharper than usual. This is, in some ways, a similar experience to sinking into a seat at a movie theater and receiving the light and sound that reach us from the screen.

Gazing absently out at the sea, we let go of reality and surrender ourselves to what lies before us. Before long, the sea becomes something more than mere scenery or a natural phenomenon — it becomes a "relationship" that blurs the boundary between meaning and meaninglessness. The sea, which continues to exist "no matter what," reappears to us — to those of us who "simply are there" — once again as something "fleeting and faint."

At such moments, the sea cannot exist unless it is seen by someone.

On the Beach at Night

Thirsty and anxious, I ended up waiting about an hour and a half before the tow truck finally arrived. The relief I felt at seeing its headlights cut through the sand, now completely swallowed in darkness, was a kind of feeling I rarely experience in ordinary daily life.

The young man who drove the tow truck was good-natured, and his casual remark — "Well, you really did it, huh?" — put me at ease. He opened up a box-like compartment at the front of the truck, hooked up a rope to my car and began pulling. After a series of adjustments, it took, all told, close to thirty minutes. The car finally slid sideways across the sand and back on to something that could, at last, be called a road.

I signed the paperwork. He told me, "Go on ahead, I'll finish tidying up here." I left behind the tow truck, and the beach where I'd ended up spending an unexpectedly long stretch of time. For some reason, I felt a faint sense of nostalgia.

On the way back, I passed by the road from the film once again. It was night, and I couldn't see a thing around me, but the car's headlights lit up the familiar curved traffic mirror. If I could one day make it to the end of that road, what kind of sea would be spread out before me?