Eyes of the Spider is this heartwarming tender set amid rural splendor slow peaceful quiet meditation comedy that allows us to empathize with a man whose young daughter was killed along the path he follows in life after his albeit pretty quickly handled revenge shooting the man responsible. This is also one of the most indicative examples of just when you think you’ve hit lower tier Kiyoshi Kurosawa you are proven to have been too hasty to judgement.
But think about Serpent’s Path for a second. This time around in Eyes of the Spider our everyman again Shô Aikawa plays a character with the exact same name NAOMI NIIJIMA is now the protagonist we follow. After he gets recruited by an old high school friend into the yakuza their first job finds them trying to verify the identity of a target and it’s so easy it’s funny what does Niijima do? He checks the man’s license. This is hilarious if you remember how hard this was in Serpent’s Path. But so yeah in the same sequence the boss asks Niijima to shoot the man and Niijima hesitates for a second then the boss says no problem and does it himself. Ultimately the biggest difference is the yakuza IWAMATU just wants to be buddies with Niijima.
The dramatic conflict turns out to be a higher ranking yakuza played by Ren Ôsugi implores Niijima to supply him with info reporting on Iwamatu who later turns out to be breaking the rules dealing with the head of the Kinsai Family. But okay the old dude Ren Ôsugi plays is this kind rock collector who spends all his time hunting for precious stones in the mountains. Drastic tonal shift from Serpent’s Kiss this film makes it okay for us to love these dudes. The yakuza in Eyes of the Spider is this aimless hijinks workplace comedy.
So much happens in the last few minutes. Spanning time. And while normally I would have thought about how I was taught a passive protagonist is poor writing this exception proves the rule. It’s profound how Niijima just deals with the hand life deals him over and over again.
When his dead daughter Mitsuko appears at their home as a ghost he just denies it and says there’s nothing there. In any other movie that would be played up for its dramatic or horror impact potential. And when he and we see that dude in the wheelchair in the span of such a short runtime oh how he and we have changed the way we think about things. Zen existentialism. Flow through life like water. Be in harmony with your surroundings what a punch. Now we’ve all been transported back to a state of childlike innocence and wonder at how beautiful it is to be alive.
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