{"id":5773,"date":"2023-05-04T06:58:17","date_gmt":"2023-05-04T13:58:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.colinmarshall.org\/?p=5773"},"modified":"2023-05-04T06:58:17","modified_gmt":"2023-05-04T13:58:17","slug":"new-yorker-murakami-in-the-movies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blog.colinmarshall.org\/?p=5773","title":{"rendered":"New Yorker: Murakami in the Movies"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-full is-resized\"><center><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/blog.colinmarshall.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/New-Yorker-Murakami-Movies-2.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-5774\" width=\"375\" height=\"532\"\/><\/center><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<p>For enthusiasts of Haruki Murakami, last month brought two major events in two different countries. One is the publication, in Japan, of his latest novel, \u201cMachi to Sono Futashika na Kabe\u201d (\u201cThe City and Its Uncertain Walls\u201d). The other is the release, in the United States, of \u201cSaules Aveugles, Femme Endormie\u201d (\u201cBlind Willow, Sleeping Woman\u201d), an animated feature based on several of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.newyorker.com\/culture\/the-new-yorker-interview\/the-underground-worlds-of-haruki-murakami\">Murakami<\/a>\u2019s short stories. In contrast to \u201cThe City and Its Uncertain Walls,\u201d about which almost all information was withheld from the public before it went on sale, \u201cBlind Willow, Sleeping Woman\u201d has been publicized with all the means available to a production of its modest scale, including a trailer that emphasizes a host of identifiable pieces of Murakamiana: prowling cats, ethereal sex, dense Japanese urban landscapes, an absent wife, a descent into darkness, and a talking humanoid frog.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That last creature appears in Murakami\u2019s short story \u201cSuper-Frog Saves Tokyo,\u201d and it\u2019s vaguely disconcerting to hear it speaking English\u2014or French, for that matter, in the film\u2019s original trailer. A French Luxembourgian Dutch Canadian co-production, \u201cBlind Willow, Sleeping Woman\u201d was directed by the composer-filmmaker Pierre F\u00f6ldes, whose official Web site says he was \u201cborn in the U.S. to Hungarian\/British parents\u201d but \u201craised in Paris.\u201d Despite lacking any obvious connection to Japan\u2014Murakami\u2019s homeland, and usually his setting\u2014F\u00f6ldes comes off as just the sort of international figure likely to be inspired by Murakami\u2019s work. In adapting that work for the screen, he adds another volume to the saga of Murakami in the movies, which, like one of the writer\u2019s own increasingly elaborate, oddity-filled novels, compensates for its frequent lapses into inelegance with the sheer fascination of aesthetic, cultural, and linguistic incongruity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Read the whole thing <a href=\"https:\/\/www.newyorker.com\/culture\/cultural-comment\/murakami-in-the-movies\">at the New Yorker<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>For enthusiasts of Haruki Murakami, last month brought two major events in two different countries. One is the publication, in Japan, of his latest novel, \u201cMachi to Sono Futashika na Kabe\u201d (\u201cThe City and Its Uncertain Walls\u201d). The other is the release, in the United States, of \u201cSaules Aveugles, Femme Endormie\u201d (\u201cBlind Willow, Sleeping Woman\u201d), [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,6,27,100],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5773","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-books","category-film","category-japan","category-new-yorker"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.colinmarshall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5773","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.colinmarshall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.colinmarshall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.colinmarshall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.colinmarshall.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5773"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/blog.colinmarshall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5773\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5775,"href":"http:\/\/blog.colinmarshall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5773\/revisions\/5775"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.colinmarshall.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5773"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.colinmarshall.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5773"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.colinmarshall.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5773"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}