2009 ‘空気人形’ Directed by Hirokazu Kore-eda
A life-size, inflatable sex doll suddenly comes to life one day. Without her owner knowing, she goes for a walk around town and falls in love with Junichi. She starts to date Junichi and gets a job at the same store where he works. Everything seems to be going perfect for her until something unexpected happens.
Kûki ningyô, Kuki Ningyo, 공기인형, Air doll (Muñeca de aire)
Air Doll. 2009. Directed by Hirokazu Koreeda.
Bae Doona is one of my favorite actresses that I was introduced to in Sens8. I felt an immediate connection to her kick ass style. In Air Doll (2009), Koreeda delivers a somewhat feminist arch in his fairy tale of a sex doll (Bae Doona) coming to life and falling in love with a video store clerk. This premise may sound shallow but the depth of life that Koreeda infused into his screenplay with Yoshiie Goda was nothing short of brilliance. Yes there is nudity but, there is an ancient story being told about life, life force (chi, prana, etc.), sex, and love.
Bae Doona’s character Nozomi awakens and feels water dripping into…
Me: An air doll comes to life as a literal air head and learns what it truly means to be human, cool, but this film has no business being so depressing.
Me: *Sees that its directed by Kore-eda*
Me: Ah. Yes. Of course.
arousal has caused many of the worlds problems and (i see a brief shot of a forearm and begin to sweat) there's, uh, there's no reason, to.. to bury our desires deep within. personally if a doll i was having sex with came alive i would execute it like in game of thrones and turn myself in to the authorities
Director: Hirokazu Koreeda (Fourth Film)
A film about loneliness in the big city - which couldn't be any truer to me, someone who lives in a big city (London) and yearns to leave the big city forever, never to come back, never to feel the cold handed loneliness of the big city because the big city is shitty and the big city isn't what I want it to be.
The "Big City" represents everything wrong with society - essentially a chasm to store humans so they can safely work and fuck in their own little freedoms. Freedoms *given* to them by those with freedoms themselves. We are often told that we are completely free but that is not…
Humanism. Not exactly the chief virtue you’d expect from a sex-doll-come-to-life story, but here we are. Maybe it’s just my low expectations talking, but this might just be the sleeper hit of the Kore-eda oeuvre so far. His first not dealing with death, it’s hard not to immediately tar this one with the outlier brush.
But I’d argue for Air Doll as the Japanese King of the emotionally-and-stylistically-stirring-drama at his most emblematic, flaunting his ability to mine sympathy and awe from the most unforeseen of pockets. And let’s be honest, the only reason this one doesn’t bomb dead in the water is because he knows a thing or two about subverting our expectations. It’s all in the execution, translating this could…
Quick take just after watching
Lise wasn't into a film tonight, so I thought I'd watch one of those that I put in the 'iffy' Lise category .... both because it's Kore-eda ... a director who has a few films that we love, but more films that we hate ... and the subject matter being, er, a sex doll.
After Life has been my favourite film of his because it was so inventive and out of the ordinary. I've always felt that his later work, even ones I've liked, bordered on family drama schmaltz.
Holy smokes! After Life doesn't hold a patch on Air Doll in the inventive department. I've never thought Kore-eda might display Kim Ki-duk traits! And, the…
Air Doll is the story of Nozomi (Bae Doona), an inflatable sex doll who miraculously comes to life! The film follows Nozomi as she explores life outside her owner's home during the hours he is away at work. Fueled by curiousity she starts to interact with the local people and even finds herself a job at the local video store.
The story starts with Nozomi's first tentative excursions outside and provides humour from her limited and confused view of humans causing some funny interactions. The film's main theme is the isolation of modern city life (Nozomi is told by a local 'most people are empty inside') and it shows well how people, although lonely, will pass many others in the…
The little things breathe life into Air Doll. Kore-eda chooses to comment on humanity through a blow-up doll protagonist, leading to delightfully surprising moments such as an old man bemoaning the hollowness of modern humans having an ironically affirming effect on such a protagonist. How an in-film flurry of giddy film buff references refreshingly take on new meaning when pondered by an unwitting newbie (Me & Earl & the Dying Girl would be green with envy).
Kore-eda's best work is both lightly charming and subtly devastating in its realism, and by extension his body of work is at its most signature when engaging with questions of humanity through the lens of magic realism, and Air Doll is one of his finest exponents…
</3 really one of the most resonant pieces of art about grappling under an unceasing patriarchy for a way to stake a claim to your own identity
