If Radin! was the French movie I saw this year that called out to me, 二重生活 would be the Japanese equivalent. As soon as I read the synopsis, I decided that this was a movie I definitely had to see at the Japanese Film Festival.
The story follows a graduate student named Tama who is in the process of writing her Masters thesis in Philosophy. She seems somewhat listless. She submits her topic proposal, to try and find the meaning of existence through interviewing 100 random people. Her supervisor, inspired by a book on his desk by Sofie Calle, suggests 1 person, instead of 100. And rather than interview them, he suggests she follow them and note down the things that they do, in order to try and gain some insight into their life. Tama questions the legality of this, and her supervisor responds that as long as she's following someone for no reason (as opposed to someone who does it for malicious or selfish purposes), it should be fine. He does set one rule: that she must not interact with her target.
Tama says she'll think it over, and goes to a bookstore to do some research on how to tail someone. While she's there, she notices her neighbour working there. He gets a text, and then has to dash off, so she decides to follow him. She continues to follow him to a café where he meets up with a woman who isn't his wife, and who hands him a watch, saying, "Don't leave it behind next time." She follows the two of them until they go into a small alley and begin to have sex. Tama paces back and forth, thinking over something, and eventually she returns home to re-write her thesis proposal to focus on one person.
I find the idea pretty fascinating, and the movie looks into the divide between a person's public life and their private life, as well as the ways in which people find a way to tame that indescribable feeling that there must be something more to life. From the start, we learn that her target is a famous book editor, whose edited works often go on to become best-sellers. He has a beautiful wife and a wonderful daughter, a nice house, and the respect of the people around him. Why would someone like that risk everything by cheating?
This probably speaks volumes of my personality, but it wasn't until recently that I realised how harmful stalking actually is. A friend of mine told me about her experience with a stalker, and how scared she felt. In her case, she knew her stalker, and was pressured not to make a big deal about it. redbeanpork also linked me a reddit thread "Men of Reddit, what creepy things have women done to you?" and I've been horrified reading all the responses.
From my perspective, I viewed it as a quest for truth. I wanted to know something about someone, so I figured as long as I didn't do anything illegal, it was fine to use everything at my disposal to find it. But people keep things hidden for a reason, and have a right to privacy. I joked about finding out the name of MrCrush's cat, but if he didn't want to tell me when asked, then I should respect that he doesn't want me to know.
Then there's the other aspect of Tama's tailing. It started as a joke, as well, but I did start taking notes about people. Mostly Jal, because he seems to find it funny, but it has extended to anyone whose phone number I have. It doesn't seem that malicious. In Jal's case, I have his preferred way to drink coffee, his cookie and cake preferences, his favourite lunch foods, his middle name and where his parents live. But he told me all of these things willingly. Is the creepy part that I've noted them down?
I also write about things that have happened to me in my journal. D made a claim about himself, saying he never did X, and I refuted it, saying that I had seen him do it in the past. He called me a liar, so I pulled out my journal, looked up the entry and told him the day that he did it, reminding him of the situation. Obviously, that was really creepy, and I shouldn't have revealed that I had a journal. But I've never felt that keeping a journal was particularly bad.
The movie left me feeling very undecided. Most of my friends joke about my stalker-ish tendencies now, and it's even becoming something that new people hear when they're introduced to me. It's often mentioned in a joking way, but stalking definitely has a negative connotation to it. Even though I don't mean anything malicious by it, I can understand people being unsettled by it.
To add another thing to my list of life changes I want to make, I'm going to try and hang up the deerstalker hat. All of my stalker-ish things I claim as me using my detective skills, but I'm not a detective, and there's no reason for me to do these things other than to satisfy my own curiosity. This is falling under the same bucket as the picturing someone naked thing. If they give their consent, then it's OK (some people seem to like to challenge me to find out information), but the default is to try and respect their privacy.
Obviously, this is going to be a big change for me, but as with everything else I do, I will try my best.
But back to the original topic, the movie was very interesting. It wasn't quite the movie I was expecting, and had more of a philosophical side than a thriller side, but it was definitely enjoyable, and it was one of those movies that makes you think about your life afterwards.
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