地球星人（エイリアン）は空想する 「Chikyuuseijin (Eirian) wa Kuusousuru」
Duration: 96 mins.
Director: Yoshiki Matsumoto
Writer: Yoshiki Matsumoto (Screenplay),
Starring: Yukichi Tanaka, Natsuki Yamada, Jin Arai, Sarasa Nakamura, Kazuki Muramatsu, Ruka Hiroe,
The truth is out there, as one “spooky” extra terrestrial-hunting FBI agent kept saying back on TV in the 90s, and this is the mantra for the journalist hero of Yoshiki Matsumoto’s feature film debut, Alien’s Daydream.
This low-budget work took the prize for Best Picture in the Japanese feature category at Skip City 2023 and won Matsumoto a boost for his next project via the SKIP CITY AWARD which supports promising directors. Viewers will find that visual flair gives a talky screenplay a sinuous feeling and sense of wonder.
Our intrepid reporter is Uto (Yukichi Tanaka), a writer for a Tokyo-based sensationalist tabloid named Jack Weekly. Far from being a sleazy muckraker, he has a sense of justice and a desire to promote the truth, something which he exercises on his personal blog while he works on trying to get his cynical editor to print socially meaningful stories. Since scandal sells, Uto’s editor assigns him the supernatural beat and sends him to Hakui, Ishikawa Prefecture, a hotspot for UFO sightings, to investigate a case of a university student being abducted.
Once there Uto and comes into contact with a mysterious high school girl named Noa (Natsuki Yamada) who has a habit of being connected to crop circles and claims to be an alien. He decides to investigate her but revealing the truth is much more complicated as it involves a cult, a kidnapping, and the police. A journalistic investigation with shades of a road movie unfolds as Uto uses a lot of shoe leather to trace the truth while the possible existence of extra-terrestrials comes in and out of focus.
While it’s a very talky movie, Matsumoto’s bold use of editing and camerawork, varies image and pace and builds out the world of the film so that while the production is indie and low-budget and dialogue heavy, the attendant imagery expands the space massively for how deeply personal and also intergalactic the story is.
Making best use of his locations, Matsumoto has the laid-back investigation into Hakui’s folklore and the intertwined history of local Buddhism and aliens from space segue into a portrait of Uto and Noa, two characters alienated from fellow Earth dwellers, he as a dogmatic truth-seeking journalist in a world of salaciousness and sensationalism and she as the victim of cults – the in-movie Arneliang cult possibly being a play on Raëlism – who his nonconformist truth-seeking exposes to persecution from society.
Locations are eye-catching since they vary from cityscapes to Ishikawa’s visually resplendent forestry, small-town homes and farms and Cosmo Isle Hakui Space and UFO Museum and there is a mockumentary feel given by the wobbly handheld camerawork that records Uto on the move. Rough cut editing for his longer investigative passages inserts impromptu interviews done with locals, images of maps mentioned within, resultant newspaper headlines and so this creates an alacritous flow of information delivery and a lot of bounce to Uto’s extended journey. Within this are laugh-out-loud sight gags to vary the tone, such as a museum worker donning an alien mask and hanging at the elbow of a local guide explaining to Uto tall tales that sound absurd and draw a funny reaction from his “alien” co-worker and equally funny po-faced reactions from our hero.
However, this is all in service to a story about characters finding their place in the wider universe and in this, the film is pretty clever in constantly invoking Uto and Noa’s sense of alienation which are explored by dialogue backed up and made interesting by the visual techniques Matsumoto deploys and also the very mannered one-note performances of Yukichi Tanaka and Natsuki Yamada who appear spaced out… not quite… but definitely distinct from their surroundings and more emotive co-stars and it flows perfectly into the push-pull dynamic of his humourless reporter persona and her true-believer persona so that when the idea that Noa and others might actually be aliens is explored it is a natural leap that maintains tension.
While the film leaves it to the viewer as to whether UFOs exist or not, when the film move away from the realism, we are guided by more perfectly crafted images, first by chapter cards that display surrealist space/alien-influenced paintings, done by Yoshiki Matsumoto and Natsuki Yamada, and also beautiful shots/sequences which stand out from the mockumentary/realist background. In one particularly moving sequence, Noa wanders the forest and is caught in a summer shower while Uto’s narration rakes over evidence. The images have such life and freshness that they remind us that it doesn’t matter if she is an alien or alienated from society, she is a alive and full of possibilities and this couples well with the final shot, a deluge of lights that swallows characters, that reminds viewers that whether on Earth or out in the universe, there is so much wonder to explore and those basic messages are a reminder of how beautiful life can be.
Alien’s Daydream played at Nippon Connection 2024 on May 28th.
The festival ran from May 28 to June 02. You can read more about the festival’s programme in an early preview and a fuller overview.
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