![]() ![]() The clapping game will have anyone hold their breath and is shot in such a way as to make it even more disturbing. Matsuda (Kujo) gives a stunning performance, his cool demeanor matches sociopathic tendencies very well and make him believable as a ruthless and detached young man with little interest even in his own life. It is against this background that the main story unfolds: a friendship between two boys gone wrong. Violence runs rampant but is handled soberly by a camera that know just how much to show to elicit a reaction. Dreams are hinted at only to be thoroughly dashed. The school-ground is a yakuza recruiting ground in the most literal of ways and the initiation into gangs is not so much a temporary revolt from troubled teens as it is a preparation for a life of crime. A movie that makes something of a pun on the word 'adolescence' (together the kanji for 'ao' and 'haru' read as 'adolescence') cannot help but make considerations about the future but these are without a doubt not promising. ![]() The almost ruined school with its dingy rooms and dense graffiti is not just the set to the action, it seems to represent the characters' lack of prospects. 'Aoi Haru' is a very bleak movie that derives its beauty precisely from the haunting sense of nihilism.
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