Reviews of Nobody Knows 2004
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2nd Letterboxd Festival - Film 1
Damn you, Hirokazu Koreeda, for making this film. Now I won't be able to get these absolutely heartbreaking scenes out of my mind.
No... I'm not really «damning» the director. He's made a tremendous film. The way he handled the children is almost beyond comparison, I think its some of the best child performances I have ever seen. Koreeda also manages to show us the small moments of joy that children are able to…
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To make something so beautiful, so tender out of something so tragic and heartbreaking takes a real skill. Hirokazu Koreeda has perfected it.
Not since Elephant Man has a film had this much of an emotional effect on me, it actually made me feel quite sick in my stomach in the last half hour and in the last 15 minutes or so I realised I was holding my breath.
The young actors have left me gobsmacked at how flawlessly they…
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I watched this as the first film of the Second Letterboxd Festival.
My heart is broken into a million little pieces. Nobody Knows is the saddest film I've ever seen. It's about how the worst mother in the world abandons the four children she attempts to hide from society. She decides to abandon them in order to get married to some random guy. The oldest of the four at age 12, named Akira, has to assume responsibility of his younger…
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Week 1 of the Second Letterboxd Film Festival
Argh. What to do with Nobody Knows. This Japanese drama, apparently based on a true story, as if it wasn't depressing enough, focuses on 4 children (aged between 5 and 12) from the same mother (but different fathers) who are left to fend for themselves after their mum decides she's had enough of them and leaves them. She does leave them some cash to buy things with, so I guess that's okay…
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2nd Letterboxd Festival - Film 1
There is not much to say after what Simone said, but I think I should declare that Nobody Knows is a terrible experience. At some point I was moving on my bed like crazy trying to figure out what was going to happen and when it would be over. Exactly the same sensation the youngest boy feels all the time. My personal displeasure for this film is not enough to change my admiration for…
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This is the first film in the Second Letterboxd Festival.
I had been hearing that Nobody Knows was a difficult film to watch, though I stayed clear of any definitive reasons so as to not be spoiled why. What I didn't expect was the emotional journey that I would embark on as I watched this movie.
Like any great and believable drama, I felt like a fly on the wall of the tiny apartment that the four kids lived in,…
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Week 1 of the Second Letterboxd Film Festival
Here's a film about a family of four Japanese kids being raised by a single mom. Each of the children is from a different father, and they must not have a thing called alimony over there because the mother seems pretty much on her own. There must be some culture difference I'm not understanding because I don't see why the mother puts the family in such a dead-end situation that is a…
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1st film of the Second Letterboxd Festival
Cheery little trifle about a bunch of abandoned orphans! I didn’t know anything about the movie beforehand, so I was bummed when the mom (side note: some Japanese women actually talk like that? I figured it was just in anime and porn) stopped showing up. Drags a bit in the second half, and the final tragedy is almost too understated. These kids have impassivity down to a science; there’s got to be a middle ground in Asian cinema between screaming melodrama and this? I was a fan of the increasingly shaggier Pokemon/Final Fantasy haircuts.
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1st film in the 2nd Lettterboxd film festival
Tragic and very moving, there were some moments of joy like Shigeru playing in the park and Yuki's squeaking shoes, but I was waiting for something bad to happen, and it did, and it was like a punch to the guts.
The child actors were amazing, and at times it felt like a fly on the wall documentary, a very believable and beautiful film.
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2nd Letterboxd Festival - Film 1
I remember having a one-piece heart and a one-piece soul before watching this movie. Now, they're shattered.
Rarely have I seen such a beautiful and realistic-like movie that made me care, that forced me to be invested.
Lord knows Mexican cinema tries that every four days. But then, this japanese film comes out of nowhere and does it perfectly.
I might've seen it a week later, but thank you so much 2nd Letterboxd festival for letting me know this exists.
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