[Categories: Specials]
Love and Pop: Hideaki Anno’s live action debut
The tagline ’schoolgirls by day…call girls by night’ has to be one of the most misleading sales pitches of any film I’ve yet seen. Ignoring the sensationalist waffle on the DVD case, this is a film that is innovative in the extreme and explains why I think Hideaki Anno is one of the best film directors of recent years.
Love and Pop is based on Ryu Murakami’s novel Topaz II that addresses the questionable practice of enjo kosai, or ‘compensated dating’. A group of sixteen-year-old school leavers are drawn into this bizarre and occasionally disturbing world for a variety of reasons that boil down to boredom and, in the case of one of them, a simple desire for more pocket money. It is essentially teenage prostitution in all but name but the film tackles the issue head-on without coming across as exploitative or evasive in the portrayal of the characters and their situations.
The film is (in)famous for the visual style, which almost exclusively uses hand-held digital cameras that are shot from peculiar angles and viewpoints (under tables, inside household objects and clothing, and so on). While it could be argued that this approach was taken for budgetry reasons, it gives a documentary feel that is ideally suited to the film’s subject. As we follow Hiromi and her friends during their misadventures, we go where they go, see what they see, from their own point of view: I don’t think any other film draws the viewer in so literally or so effectively.
Aside from the dizziness-inducing cinematography this shows more trademark ‘anno-isms’ in its underlying themes, namely the deep character introspection and soul-searching. It explores the reasons why the characters are doing what they are doing - believe me, some of these things are quite shocking and require an adequate explanation - which inevitably gives it a strong social commentary aspect. The girls each have their own reasons for hanging around with older and decidedly odd men but it is motivated by the ever-present peer pressure, teenage naivety and a society that, like our own, revolves around materialism and money.
Love and Pop has several messages to convey including those of growing up and drawing attention to a serious social issue. It is certainly not intended to make enjo kosai look fun or exciting, nor make eye candy of its stars - in fact, it isn’t even entertaining in a conventional sense at some points, although the eccentricities of some men they meet raise a smile occasionally. This is a film that falls squarely in the ‘indie’ and ‘arthouse’ categories; morso than Anno’s follow-up movie Shiki-Jitsu, which at least uses conventional cinematography and tells a story more typical of a feature film.
Summary
Personally I found Love and Pop to be quite uncomfortable viewing in places and less enjoyable than the likes of Shiki Jitsu. That is not to say it is an inferior film - quite the reverse in fact. It is more unconventional, more daring and hard-hitting in the nature of the subject matter and the way in which it is shown. The ‘chick flick’ atmosphere of first half (the other reason why I found it heavy-going at first) is merely the setting-up of the film’s principle themes that, thanks to that notoriously quirky camerawork, take the viewer firmly by the arm into a seedy underbelly of contemporary society. If you’re an Anno fan this is essential but anyone who appreciates originality and innovation in their movie viewing will find this a challenging but extremely interesting experience.
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