Last film by Takashi Shimizu, The suicide forest rehabilitates the myth of Aokigahara region. More known as Jukai (« Sea of trees » in Japanese), these woods of nearly 35km2 have had a sad reputation since the 1950s, since it is a popular place for suicidal people. In 1993, Japanese writer Wataru Tsurumi wrote the controversial Kanzen Jisatsu Manyuaru, True « complete suicide instructions » where the province was advised as the perfect place to end its days. It is quite naturally that Jukai Forest cultivates his deadly legend among filmmakers of all kinds. After the drama The Sea of Trees Gus Van Sant and the horror movie The Forest by Jason Zada, Takashi Shimizu, director of The Grudge, to propose his own reading of the Japanese myth.
Jukai Watch
The beginning of the film makes us witness live the death of a young videographer on expedition to the suicide forest. This first scene probably echoes the shooting of the vlog of the self-centered yotuber Logan Paul, who discovered in 2017 the body of a young man who had hung himself in the forest and who had been polemic following the broadcast of the shock video. With a selfie pole and a red safety ribbon as Ariane thread, the young yellow waxed vloguer here looks like a grassy Dora explorer. It is live and with the scrolling chat that she mysteriously dies under the fire of the spotlight and digital indifference.
This side Blair Witch Revisited is certainly not very original but it effectively introduces the subject of the film. Hibiki also witnessed the death of the videographer and will conduct the investigation. A mysterious box is found in the vicinity and since she was hit by Hibiki and her sister Naki, a spiral of fatal accidents snare over the area. Jukai then locks in a long corridor that gradually loses the viewer, for lack of narrative horizon. It is not for lack of ideas but the film lacks rhythm and consistency in editing.
«The forest of the night feeds on young people like you.
A lot of life. »
We finally come out tired by an intrigue that lacks a leading thread and fails to provide any sympathy for its protagonists, too smooth and aseptic to arouse compassion, if not a premise of sympathy. Some of them seem to come out of nowhere, without any real understanding of their intention or role in history. It's no less than 17 actors with very few replicas that chain up! Until generic, Takashi Shimizu seeks to abound forest mythology Jukai by small notes too clumsy for magic to work.
The box that captures children
Undoubtedly too sluggish in clues to keep the attention of the public, the film simmers in a narrative with flat encephalogram, without real twists for almost two hours almost endless. It's a shame because some scenes do not lack visual identity. One will think of the revelations of the past through the smartphone used as a camera, like video games Project Zero or certain suicides, which by their fulgurance do not leave indifferent.
Takashi Shimizu seems to have had too much ideas that he could not articulate between them. Never does the spectator feel a start of cold sweat beading on his neck. Disappointed, The suicide forest lack of breath and consistency despite some rare findings. Released this week in VOD, DVD and Blu-ray, Jukai is to be reserved to the aficionados of the filmmaker who are not afraid of lengths.
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