Seven Weeks is a 2014 film directed by Nobuhiko Obayashi. The film stars Tōru Shinagawa, Takako Tokiwa, Tokie Hidari, Takehiro Murata, Yutaka Matsushige, Shunsuke Kubozuka, Saki Terashima and Hirona Yamazaki. The film follows the aftermath of the atomic bomb in modern society and how it links to the Fukushima incident.
The film states that people are replaced with death symbolically showing the cycle of life and death as the tale of death is normal as it shows the part of a person’s life and the future that life will go on. Death is a main theme in the film with the main woman coming back from treating a sick person and the film contains theme of love and love hurts. The woman finds that her granddad was haunted by his past before he died as the film comments on the effects of Fukashima and the atomic bomb. The film asks the moral question should they revive someone who wants to die, as the doctors help revives him, and they remember him. They then remember him recounting story of the past in that he hates luxury stating even if you win the war, you loose. The film contains films of nostalgia and childhood as the shows that people like the girl have lost everyone. With. The bomb people die young in the family as no one cares about the grandpa no one cares about the old.
The children tell stories about their parents dying contrasted with the main girl’s brother how is young and lively as the comment on the dangers of nuclear power with Fukashima. With the flashbacks it shows that traditional life in japan has been killed by the war. The estranged sister then comes to her granddad and talks to him. He wants to pass at home, but he dies in the hospital as he looks peaceful time has metaphorically stopped with the Fukashima incident and the atomic bomb. The doctor ends up hanging himself as the have a traditional funeral at the temple. In a flashback the granddad makes a coffee for the granddaughter who wonders how many brews he has left in him as he wants nothing at the funeral but the red heart sutra to be read as nothing will stop his loneliness and everyone is only due to the shadow of Fukashima. Eventually he overcomes loneliness and in a poetic way he is not lonely anymore in his final days. He plays his record of fighter planes as he looks at all the old stuff, he encounters such as soviet fighters as his past catches up to him. This ideology is shown throughout with the food being post war and for china as Japan copied other cultures and abounded their own.
The film rejects the idea that life is worthless the film states that life has value, and nobody wants to die especially in war, as the old guy wanted to due at home as the woman who looked after him feels guilty as they all greave. The funeral is both traditional and modern as with the funeral there are diggers in the backgrounds people talk about it in a cold and traditional way. They talk about due to him dying the family will ultimately have to sell his house. The ghost of the granddad come to the grandmother saying to love for a long time as the people decide to run a shop.
The film contains the theme of the traditional and new world clashing as there is a banquet held after the funeral is what they want but the old guy moans about this. He doesn’t want to go but he to because the priest brother’s wife is someone in his past and his worried hi bother will expose him for being poor in his past. They unveil a monument of miner who died who is part of the town as a group of people are playing interments in the snow leading spirits to the land of the dead. The granddad smokes saying there are his enemy they are killing him as the doctor smokes and the girl smokes. The granddad reads traditional war poetry of a poet who died when he was young who killed himself but had no regrets and therefore, he doesn’t smoke anymore. With the changing of time there are no trials anymore, and he doesn’t fix his watch as he lives on lives on his own time. The mine was an evacuation site during the war as the guy his mum and his sister all came here and sang a song. His sister now remembers him via an old photo as they merge people around Fukashima as they talk about the place passivity, and they found human. Bones in the dig of a Fukashima girl as old flames meet each other now having new jobs. The guy reads his book showing the childhood memories of his youth and happiness, this shows both the change and non-changing elements of times the film states perving past items form nostalgic memories of the past causing flashbacks.
The funeral becomes like a drunk wedding reception remembering the war. The anti-war elements show life begins when you lose everything as life is caught in a time warp. People don’t know the past death of war they talk about Japan losing to other countries and comment of bikini island and irony of peace with nukes, as the US and Russia knocked out japan but hey are allies only enemies draw lines. They talk about the good and bad of the nuclear power plant. Everything seems to drag on and is never ending. War takes everything the line in the sand should be love as love is bleeding together, the film states that they were going to drop the bomb in Sapporo with showcases the horrors of war as bombers delivered aid after the war. The mum of the main character is shown to have died in childbirth. This shown with the train departing as she sees his granddad like a tree sitting silently as she talks to the old man about the war as his following his coal miner’s fiend as he wants alone after the war as over was when he died. The married and the children made everyone who went to war prepared to die. The old place was changed but her wax portrait was moved to his room as he painted her as the girl makes sandwiches for him which were a luxury during war as the film contains themes of spirits, presence, and reincarnation. The film contains themes of growing up leaving youth behind and adulthood, as well as themes of relationships dying as memories are linked to objects of the past and relate to people.
The woman runs into old loves as she metaphorically dies, and he literally dies as the film is a about going home to the past. She recites the same poem as her dad linking into the idea if the past and going back to a better time, as the film shows a flashback of meeting her old man going back to her idealist past. She must leave the old man and goes back as he recounts his past as the film contains themes of Japanese tradition individualism, family, and war. He stirs things up as he has jealously with his fiend and a girl as he seen to be a coward. War is brutal and is not art, the love of his girl was fictious it was jealously and the soldiers in war had their houses destroyed as the guy saved his paintings. He completed his painting of her as he wanted her nude, but she didn’t link to the idea of post war freedom through art as all he can do is paint as he wants her nude like a new-born.
The nurses commit suicide as they believed they are going to be raped by the Russians, as a couple embrace as they talk about their love as the guy is beaten and the girl is raped. This links to themes of national pride, memories of youth, the horrors of war and love. These people knew the effects war had on people as he killed the Russians as they had raped the woman and he then kills her out of mercy. That is the story of his youth, as the film shows that the woman who had her husband killed took care of her parents until they died. A theme park Canada world was built on the mine for tourism which destroyed the culture of the town but for a practical purpose, as the soviets joined and killed the Japanese. The atomic bomb is now a part of pop culture in other countries as japan was also developing nukes and now develops anti-nuclear energy. The guy then goes to his granddad who is painting the nude woman as the woman meets her old friend is jealous of her looks and hates her. Death is a circle of life as friendly tombstones are rubbed with sinder as they talk about marriage and leave flowers.
The film contains this idea of looking to the future as the guy quits his job at the nucellar plant as the future is in renewable energy, this idea of moving on is prevalent as they get married, they must change eh way they live their life for the better as sacrifices must be made. The main girl ultimately feels as if she owes a dept to Fukashima as he talks about how she is going to rebuild it as a symbol of hope, as the guy has a picture of the dead Russians family who he married his wife and had a family with her. They hope that there is never another war, he states that. He will not forgive the enemy as she died for nothing but at least she existed. The film states the idea of getting through the good and the bad together. This film shows the idea that’s things will be ok as even though lots of people were killed in the war lots of people survived. The girl reunites with the guy as they talk about the port and his memories painting the dead girl as the memory is burnt into him. The film states that the war ended on different days for different people as the future must be created with an understanding of the past to figure out who you are, with the message of learning form the past make a better future with no war.
Seven Weeks is a film about the aftermath of the atomic bomb and how that links to the Fukashima incident with an anti-war through line. That film is about understanding the past to figure out who you are and learn form it to make a better future.