A Life Retold by Residual Artefacts: Tetsuya Nakashima's Memories of Matsuko (2006)

Tetsuya Nakashima’s 2006 film Memories of Matsuko, explains the life of Matsuko Kawajiri through the eyes and imagination of our protagonist Sho, her nephew. The film can be categorized as a coming-of-age film, though it is vicarious, and it is comprised like a jigsaw puzzle: Sho tries to complete the whole picture by seeking insight from the artefacts that are left behind in Matsuko’s dilapidated house after her death. Sho incidentally obtains the task of reassembling the life of her aunt while cleaning up the ruinous apartment Matsuko left behind- it was, in fact, his father's order to Sho. From memory fragments, the life and tragedy of Matsuko are unveiled to both Sho and the audience, it is an irrevocable and awe-inspiring trip into the bowels into agony, pain, grief, sadness, despair, loneliness, estrangement, and, of course, love.

One of the key features of the movie is Nakashima’s excessive use of bright visuals coupled with overexposed cinematography and vivid colors. The composition of the film is unprecedented, it is an extremely manifest signature of Nakashima which is not easy for other directors to reiterate. Moreover, there is a significant tendency for the film to fall into the depths of musical narrative, as the employment of J-Pop is either promoted through Matsuko or other persons.

Memories of Matsuko can be seen as a film that revolves around searching for something greater than what is at hand in the status quo, be it for money, love, happiness, or, most importantly, purpose. Matsuko was in search of all of the above aforementioned concepts though she failed to acquire, in the long term, every single one of them which renders her life tragic. Throughout her life, Matsuko has been all of these: a lonely and neglected daughter, school teacher, estranged family member, abused and beaten girlfriend, massage parlor girl, murderer, hairdresser, and a vagabond in the late stages of her life. The initial abandonment and disapproval of her father, the beginning of her father issues, is almost the cause of everything that went wrong in her life: she developed a people-pleaser personality which led to her getting sacked from her post at the school due to some theft complications and although she was severely abused and beaten by a handful of transient lovers she endured all of that pain so that she does not feel lonely as her father made her felt all her childhood. Another coping mechanism that she had developed because of her traumatic childhood was making a unique silly face she learned at an amusement park when she was visiting with his father. This smile, for some time in her life, is used to garner her father’s approval and validation—which was at times successful—however, she also occasionally employed it during her professional and outside life which shows how far the trauma of abandonment is deeply entrenched within her.

Nakashima gives us a strong message about the monetization of meaning and happiness in life. For many people, especially her brother and neighbors, Matsuko led a meaningless and unfulfilled life because she had never seen fiscal success or stability. However, Nakashima points out that the effect of Matsuko in the lives of people she has been in is so strong that physicality and materialization of meaning are so far inferior to what she has provided in spirituality, emotion, and insight: “[L]ife’s not valued by what one does, but by what one gives.” Matsuko’s demonetized effect on Ryu, Megumi, Tetsuyo, Kenji, Sho, and many others is far more superior than what she could have ever provided with money or other material objects, which renders the definition of life as leaving your imprints on someone else’s life through your personality, kindness, humor, and good nature; not with a hefty paycheck, house, fancy car, and anything that the money can buy.