Cannot go back to the hometown –“River Children’s summer”
“River Children’s summer” is directed by Japanese director Each Yukawa. It tells the story of Xiao, a river child who was born in Edo period but was accidentally sealed in a stone. In modern times, he is accidentally picked up by a little boy Yasuichi and has a series of things happen with him. The style of the film is fresh and warm, but with thick lingering sadness. Through the experience of He tong Xiaoku, the film reflects the serious degradation of nature caused by the rapid development of modern human beings. However, while revealing the problems of human society, it also comforts people’s nostalgia for their lost hometown through He tong Xiao’s words and deeds.
During the Edo Period, river children still had their own place to live, but people never gave up territorial expansion. The father of the river children thought that he should have a good talk with human beings and leave a corner of the river children to live in. The naive river boy thought that as long as he served the fat and beautiful carp, human desires could be satisfied and his hometown could be preserved, but what followed was the disaster of killing himself and his family. I do not know is retribution, or lucky, the river child because of the earthquake into the cracks in the ground, since sleeping. And when it wakes up from the dream, the hometown has become the hometown that cannot go back.
Wake up the river child lucky met the little boy Kang Yi, slowly they become partners. Although forget his name, do not know where he is, but the idea of going home has been in the small cool (Kang a river child name) heart. After the recovery of physical strength, Kang with a small cool began the journey home. In the face of fast cars, huge trams, and tall buildings stand in the dragon swamp, little cool cannot see a river boy’s shadow, and instead, is human, human, human.
The world is full of traces of human beings, small cool no longer found a river boy, the former hometown has been replaced by high-rise buildings, and the former river can no longer see the shadow of father and people.
Obviously, alone in a foreign land for strangers, no longer can find the same kind of small cool, destined to be in this full of human habitation world, difficult to find their own hometown. Kind-hearted Kang Yi and small cool will also encounter a variety of problems and difficulties, especially in the small cool as a river boy’s identity exposed to human society, everything seems to have changed.
Hometown is not to go back to, hometown refers to clean rivers, lush forests, and vibrant land, not only human themselves, everything in nature together in harmony. But the film through the perspective of Xiao Ku, Xiao Ku behavior and the surrounding environment is incompatible. It shows the rapid progress of human society, but the question also follows, convenient transportation, really make us convenient? Has the ever-increasing number of channels on television really broadened our horizons? With the constant updating of science and technology, does it bring us greater nothingness or a full spiritual life? Human beings try hard to change themselves, to make themselves better, but human society has developed so far, our life has really changed a lot, our life is really better because of this?
Cannot go back to the hometown, hometown refers to the loneliness of no similar, even if the small partner Kang a kind, caring partners, but it cannot hide, he and small cool is not the same. In the film, when the news of the Kang family having a river boy spreads in the human society, people extend their hands of desire to the Kang family. Instead of refusing, the Kang family enjoys the feeling of being famous. Although in the escape caused by the revenge of killing his father caused by Xiao cool, Kang Yi realizes his own problem and fails to protect his partner, but the human stress response is an established fact. Kang Yi is a little boy living in the modern city, he adapted to the modern life, can ride a bicycle, fast bus, can take you anywhere Shinkansen, in short, he is not just want to go back to the hometown of the clear stream swimming in the small cool partner.
Compared to Kagyu, the other humans are less like Xiao. “Humans can’t be trusted.” Simple little cool in the first time to say goodbye, just words will tell the father’s teachings Kang one family, do not take into account the fact that they are human. When a living river boy is known, human desires flood the family. Kang a father because of identity and to the small cool constantly put forward upgrade requirements, TV producers because of the hot spot of the small cool desperately rushed to the door of the Kang family, countless media and ordinary people because of desire and curiosity of the small cool and uncle chase, there are warriors because of fear and the slaughter of the small cool father. Human behavior tells us that we are not cool companions.
Whether Xiao cool can find his own kind in this place full of human beings, the film finally gives us a good expectation; some monsters have learned to pretend to be human, into the society. And small cool will be in the temporary rest, once again set foot on the journey home, the river tong small cool’s innocence and beauty, let us cannot help but through him to miss the memory of their own. Cannot go back to the hometown, the hometown of their own was not so pure, beautiful and persistent. Cannot go back to the hometown, and we all the way to recall, looking for is not that never change their own and cannot go back to the hometown?
Finally, with a little more to say about send-off, the film does a good job of it, not just technically, but emotionally as well. After the film appeared in the broken arm, has been telling the story of farewell, small cool cannot face the dead father, uncle in the process of protecting small cool accidental death, uncle for the original owner of not forget for a moment, Kang and chrysanthemum autumn mutual feelings after the departure, and Kang a family to small cool collective farewell. Parting is a topic that each of us can’t avoid. The so-called parting is inevitable in one’s whole life. But many people have no way to face separation this thing, whether unwilling to face, have a fantasy, or hoarseness, try to retain, cannot avoid the pain of separation.
