Bu Su is a 1987 film made by Jun Ichikawa starring Tomita Yasuko. In 1990 he made Goodbye Tsugumi, the novel written by Yoshimoto Banana, into a film. And in 2004 he made Tony Takitani, the short story by Murakami Haruki, into a film. This is one of the few films Murakami has allowed to be made from his books. Of significance to Yoshimoto is the film Zawa Zawa Shimo-Kitazawa which she references at the beginning of her novel Moshi Moshi Shimo-Kitazawa. Clearly when you look at his films there is an affinity in his subject matter and that which Yoshimoto has made her own over the last 25 years.
Moshi Moshi Shimo-Kitazawa was first published serially on a monthly basis in the Mainichi Shimbun during 2009 - 2010. Typically for Yoshimoto Banana's fiction it starts with a death. The narrator's father, a musician, has been seduced by a woman whose pale complexion reminds them of that of a fox or a snake. She and her mother believe that her father was bewitched before both of them were killed in a love suicide. In shock and despair the narrator watches the Ichikawa Jun film and is inspired by the pianist Fujiko Hemming to move to Shimo-Kitazawa. Yocchan finds a room there after a friend marries and moves to England. The rent is cheap and whilst there is a café on the ground floor, at night the building is empty. She is enjoying her independence when her mother decides to move in. She can no longer bear living in the house in Meguro. Not only are memories too painful but she has also seen the ghost of her dead husband. Yocchan is reluctant at first but agrees because it makes sense financially. Her mother will come into money if and when the family house in Hokkaido is sold. What is most apparent to Yocchan, however, is a change in her mother who is usually so careful and so considered, unlike her father who was often on tour playing keyboards or else recording.
That summer is particularly hot and neither of them has an appetite for eating but they go to a little café in Shimo Kita and eat a delicious kaki kori ice and salad. The sincerity with which Michiyo san prepares her meals refreshed their bodies even though Yocchan's mother says that her heart still feels dead inside. At this time Yocchan is constantly reliving memories of the last time that she saw her father. He wanted her to come with him to a live gig in Ginza but she had another appointment. He promised to take her to an expensive French restaurant when he comes back so she can do some research but this is the last time that she saw him alive. Food is important and she is upset that he father will never be able to eat the food that she is now able to make. His only memory was of the food she had prepared when she was younger and less skilled.
Yocchan is curious after a while what her mother does while she is at work each day. Her mother feels more comfortable in Shimo Kita than in Meguro because no-one knows her and she is free to be herself. She starts to dress differently and no longer dresses like a 'madam'. She describes all of the shops that she visits and it turns out she even visits the restaurant where Yocchan works during her breaks. Yocchan is embarrassed by this but says to her mother that it is good for the shop to have customers. They reminisce about a family trip to Paris. It was very enjoyable like all of their other memories except for the last one. Yocchan imagines her father at home in Meguro alone playing the piano and eating cup noodles whilst wearing odd coloured socks. She thinks that if he had rally loved the other woman his ghost wouldn't have come back to the family home. That night Yocchan sees her father in a dream. He had come home to look for his mobile phone so he could call her mother. Yocchan wants to help him but she can't say anything. While she is looking at his back she wakes up and sees her mother sleeping. Looking at her mother's spine she feels reassured and falls asleep.
One day a new customer comes to the restaurant (named Re-Riyan). Both Yocchan and Michiyo san are impressed by his table manners. Yocchan is taken aback at how much he reminds her of her father. When she goes to buy coffee in her break they meet in the street and it turns out that he knew her father. He used to watch him play at the live house in Shinjuku. Whilst Yocchan's father played mature English style rock Shintani kun, however, prefers Japanese Indie bands... Shintani kun also knows Yamazaki san, her father's best friend. He meets her in the street one day and she agrees to meet him after work. He asks her about her father and says that Yamazaki san had told him about the woman. Yocchan is disturbed decides to contact with Yamazaki san. At first Yamazaki san is reluctant to talk about the woman but he informs Yocchan that not only was it a love suicide but she had tried it once before with another man but failed. Prior to this she had had borrowed money until there was no more money left. Yamazaki san said that even though her father had had plans go build his own studio he had no money in his account when he died. It turns out that the woman was his niece. Yocchan realises that what she had seen in her dream was true. But Yamazaki reassures her of the strong feelings that 'Imo', her father, had for his family and she feels reassured.
Yocchan has a bad dream in which she calls home and her father answers. She can feels his love and starts to cry but the connection is bad and the she can't hear anything. She then hears a woman's voice and takes the phone away from her ear. She is scared and her mother wakes her up telling her that she was calling out for her father. Her mother apologises for only thinking about herself. After work Yocchan has a drink in the underground in a bar that is full of old men and women that looks like something out of the Showa period. She tells Shintani kun about her dream and about how her mother saw her father's ghost in Meguro and he says that he believes her. Working in a live house, he sees the effects of alcohol and drugs on musicians and groupies who die young and while he is not sure if he believes in ghosts, he knows that strange things happen. He suggests she visits her father's grave to see how she feels. She remembers the awful trip she and her mother made to Ibaraki when he father died. He offers to go with her. She is not so sure. He tells her that she has to take her time to get over the loss of her father. She asks him how he knows so much about these things even though he is young. He tells her that it is because of the demons that he has seen people struggling with at the live house over the years.
Yocchan is working at the restaurant one day when she has a visitor from Ibaraki. Nakanishi san introduces herself by saying that her first husband nearly became a victim of the strange woman. She blames herself for what happened to Yocchan's father and wants to know where his grave is so that she can light some incense and offer some prayers for his repose. Yocchan is confused and afraid at first but she is convinced by the woman's apparent sincerity and tells her. She has to tell someone but she can't decide who to tell. Her mother has started working as a waitress so she doesn't want to upset her and she doesn't want to tell Shintani kun so she decides to call Yamazaki instead. He listens to her story and eases her fears by telling her that she has done nothing wrong. He decides that he will go with her and they will visit he forest where her father died with the strange woman and they will take the band with them so that afterwards they can play her father's songs. They will turn the trip into a celebration. Yocchan is overjoyed.
At this point Yocchan gets some bad news... The restaurant where she works has to close because of rising superannuation costs. Michiyo san plans to close the restaurant and go to France for six months before she comes back to Shimo Kitazawa to open a smaller shop. She offers Yocchan a job in the new restaurant but on a lower salary. Not only does Yocchan want to work in the new shop she also wants to go to France with Michiyo san. Michiyo san agrees to take her saying that they can stay with a friend and then travel in the provinces to try various foods and to make plans for the menu for the new shop. Yocchan doesn't want to leave Shimo Kitazawa, it feels like her home town. You can take your time there unlike in many other places in Tokyo. This is one of the reasons why she likes Shintani kun... As her feelings for him grow there is no pressure on her to take relationship any further. She thinks about she and her mother have created healthy lives in Shimo Kitazawa and thinks that they could have done it together as a family if her father was still alive. This thought saddens her...
Shintani kun invites Yocchan to his apartment and to her surprise his stereo is smaller than she thought but the kitchen is well used and the floor is shining. He kisses her but refuses to take things further because she is not yet ready. He assures her that he is a 'beast' but he wants to give her time. Yocchan visits the family home in Meguro for the last time with her mother and even though there is an oppressive atmosphere they do some cleaning. They decide to eat curry on the way home at a favourite local restaurant and then at the last minute as they are locking the doors they both decide at the same time to get Yocchan's father's photograph from the piano. They have family photographs at the apartment in Shimo Kitazawa but this is the only photograph they have of him on his own. They burn some incense and light some candles to go with the photograph and in this way feel they have brought his spirit home to live with them..
Yocchan has another dream in which she goes back to the Meguro home but all of the furniture has been taken away for a new family to move in. The phone rings and when she picks it up it is her father. She asks him if he loves them but there is no reply. She tells him that they have taken his photograph. She realizes that he wanted to call them when he died. She wakes up and sees her mother sleeping. She has the feeling that they managed to get the photograph just in time. Yocchan then gets another visit from Nakanishi san. Yocchan thanks her for visiting he father's grave but she says she has been busy. Instead she has brought a gift. It is a purse with some salt in it which a friend who is knowledgeable about the spirit world has given her. She tells Yocchan to take it with her when she goes to visit the forest where her father died and when she goes to visit his grave. No doubt this is the last time that she will see her Yocchan thinks when she leaves.
Yocchan goes to a 70s bar with Shintani kun that looks like it has been designed by some drunken Gaudi. There is no change in their relationship. They meet Yocchan's mother who goes home early so that they can enjoy their date together. Her mother goes to Meguro and brings her giant TV set to Shim Kita. Inside herself Yocchan feel si something that is waiting and she is not sure what it is. It might be a miniature of what killed her father. When she gets home her mother is in front of the giant TV. She is watching a movie starring Matsuda Yusaku... Yocchan feels there is some kind of hint there. It was a favourite movie of her mother's and her father took her to see it when she was young.
Michiyo san gets a fever and Moriyama san comes to help out at the restaurant. Yocchan realises that she is not ready yet to fill Michiyo san's shoes. She can barely cope with the demands of the job. Shintani kun reassures her. He tells her that he can't wait any longer and asks her to come home with him They have sex as soon as they get there and then he makes her tea. She goes home in a taxi but can't stop crying. She fears that it won't last and that it isn't real love. She tells him they can't go out together for a while and that she needs time. She asks her mother about her relationship with Shintani kun and she says they just look like friends who have slept together... They do not look like people who would marry each other. Yocchan tells her mother about the woman from Ibaraki and about her plan to visit the forest where her father died so she can say some prayers. Her mother refuses to go with her. She won't prayer for the other woman. Her mother has also been seeing dreams...
Yocchan has lots to do to get ready to go to France but just can't get motivated. She decides to visit Ibaraki that day as the weather is fine. At the station, however, she feels like she has forgotten something. She thinks of calling Shintani kun but calls Yamazaki san instead. She is crying on the phone and he as he is by coincidence already at Tokyo station he agrees to drive to Ibaraki and meet her there. She feels good again and realises that she likes Yamazaki more than Shintani kun. But Yamazaki is 45 years old and he is married. When they get to Ibaraki the weather is fine and Yamazaki san feels that Imo (his nickname for Yocchan's father) will enter Nirvana. They go to the suicide spot in the forest in Yamazaki san's Mini Cooper. It is a deserted area with a dirt road and only a few houses. The ride is very bumpy... The bodies were found by a book illustrator and Yocchan and her mother were grateful for their kindness at the time.
The branches on the road make visibility difficult. When they come to the spot, they decide to bury the charm they have brought in the ground. Yocchan is amazed that Yamazaki san has a shovel in his boot. She also buries her father's mobile phone which is in pieces after her mother stamped on it. Yamazaki san recognizes it and asks what happened to it. She explains about her mother's anger... It turns out that Yamazaki san was divorced two years earlier. His wife left him for a younger man. She wanted to have a baby. Yocchan is happy to hear this news but feels that he has probably already met someone else. Yamazaki san's life has changed a lot in the last two years with the death of his best friend and his divorce. He tells Yocchan how different she is to her parents always thinking of others before herself. She feels grateful for his kind words. Yocchan tells him that she likes him but he warns her against having feelings for him because she is still grieving. They debate about whether to go to the aquarium that he father loved but decided to go another time. Yocchan realises that she probably won't see Shintani kun for a long time. It wasn't a mistake but she wants to begin a new life. She says goodbye to the Re Riyan-Shintani period of her life.
Back in Tokyo, Yamazaki san treats Yocchan to soba at a very expensive restaurant. He asks her if she has spoken about him to her mother? She says yes. She talks about not going home and he warns her again. She realises that he has known her since she was a child and that that is probably still how he sees her. He tells her that her father had stomach cancer but refused to go to the hospital. She is shocked but thinks that her father probably told her mother. Yamazaki san asks her why she likes him and why she wants to sleep with him. She explains and he accepts. It is different to being with Shintani kun. Shintani kun was more practiced in the ways of sex whereas Yamazaki had just had sex with the same woman. Yocchan feels better having sex with Yamazaki san because he sees the 'real her'. She takes a taxi back home and they agree not to meet until she comes back from France. The only thing that she asks is that he doesn't start living with someone else. he can have sex with them but she would like to see how they feel when she gets back. She gets out of the taxi near the Shimo Kita station and walks home looking at the shops and reflecting on the life that she has made there and the people that she has met. She feels that this is her home town. She is sad that the sakura tree will be cut down for the new building but she will carry the memory of it inside her like she carries inside her her father's DNA.
That summer is particularly hot and neither of them has an appetite for eating but they go to a little café in Shimo Kita and eat a delicious kaki kori ice and salad. The sincerity with which Michiyo san prepares her meals refreshed their bodies even though Yocchan's mother says that her heart still feels dead inside. At this time Yocchan is constantly reliving memories of the last time that she saw her father. He wanted her to come with him to a live gig in Ginza but she had another appointment. He promised to take her to an expensive French restaurant when he comes back so she can do some research but this is the last time that she saw him alive. Food is important and she is upset that he father will never be able to eat the food that she is now able to make. His only memory was of the food she had prepared when she was younger and less skilled.
Yocchan is curious after a while what her mother does while she is at work each day. Her mother feels more comfortable in Shimo Kita than in Meguro because no-one knows her and she is free to be herself. She starts to dress differently and no longer dresses like a 'madam'. She describes all of the shops that she visits and it turns out she even visits the restaurant where Yocchan works during her breaks. Yocchan is embarrassed by this but says to her mother that it is good for the shop to have customers. They reminisce about a family trip to Paris. It was very enjoyable like all of their other memories except for the last one. Yocchan imagines her father at home in Meguro alone playing the piano and eating cup noodles whilst wearing odd coloured socks. She thinks that if he had rally loved the other woman his ghost wouldn't have come back to the family home. That night Yocchan sees her father in a dream. He had come home to look for his mobile phone so he could call her mother. Yocchan wants to help him but she can't say anything. While she is looking at his back she wakes up and sees her mother sleeping. Looking at her mother's spine she feels reassured and falls asleep.
One day a new customer comes to the restaurant (named Re-Riyan). Both Yocchan and Michiyo san are impressed by his table manners. Yocchan is taken aback at how much he reminds her of her father. When she goes to buy coffee in her break they meet in the street and it turns out that he knew her father. He used to watch him play at the live house in Shinjuku. Whilst Yocchan's father played mature English style rock Shintani kun, however, prefers Japanese Indie bands... Shintani kun also knows Yamazaki san, her father's best friend. He meets her in the street one day and she agrees to meet him after work. He asks her about her father and says that Yamazaki san had told him about the woman. Yocchan is disturbed decides to contact with Yamazaki san. At first Yamazaki san is reluctant to talk about the woman but he informs Yocchan that not only was it a love suicide but she had tried it once before with another man but failed. Prior to this she had had borrowed money until there was no more money left. Yamazaki san said that even though her father had had plans go build his own studio he had no money in his account when he died. It turns out that the woman was his niece. Yocchan realises that what she had seen in her dream was true. But Yamazaki reassures her of the strong feelings that 'Imo', her father, had for his family and she feels reassured.
Yocchan has a bad dream in which she calls home and her father answers. She can feels his love and starts to cry but the connection is bad and the she can't hear anything. She then hears a woman's voice and takes the phone away from her ear. She is scared and her mother wakes her up telling her that she was calling out for her father. Her mother apologises for only thinking about herself. After work Yocchan has a drink in the underground in a bar that is full of old men and women that looks like something out of the Showa period. She tells Shintani kun about her dream and about how her mother saw her father's ghost in Meguro and he says that he believes her. Working in a live house, he sees the effects of alcohol and drugs on musicians and groupies who die young and while he is not sure if he believes in ghosts, he knows that strange things happen. He suggests she visits her father's grave to see how she feels. She remembers the awful trip she and her mother made to Ibaraki when he father died. He offers to go with her. She is not so sure. He tells her that she has to take her time to get over the loss of her father. She asks him how he knows so much about these things even though he is young. He tells her that it is because of the demons that he has seen people struggling with at the live house over the years.
Yocchan is working at the restaurant one day when she has a visitor from Ibaraki. Nakanishi san introduces herself by saying that her first husband nearly became a victim of the strange woman. She blames herself for what happened to Yocchan's father and wants to know where his grave is so that she can light some incense and offer some prayers for his repose. Yocchan is confused and afraid at first but she is convinced by the woman's apparent sincerity and tells her. She has to tell someone but she can't decide who to tell. Her mother has started working as a waitress so she doesn't want to upset her and she doesn't want to tell Shintani kun so she decides to call Yamazaki instead. He listens to her story and eases her fears by telling her that she has done nothing wrong. He decides that he will go with her and they will visit he forest where her father died with the strange woman and they will take the band with them so that afterwards they can play her father's songs. They will turn the trip into a celebration. Yocchan is overjoyed.
At this point Yocchan gets some bad news... The restaurant where she works has to close because of rising superannuation costs. Michiyo san plans to close the restaurant and go to France for six months before she comes back to Shimo Kitazawa to open a smaller shop. She offers Yocchan a job in the new restaurant but on a lower salary. Not only does Yocchan want to work in the new shop she also wants to go to France with Michiyo san. Michiyo san agrees to take her saying that they can stay with a friend and then travel in the provinces to try various foods and to make plans for the menu for the new shop. Yocchan doesn't want to leave Shimo Kitazawa, it feels like her home town. You can take your time there unlike in many other places in Tokyo. This is one of the reasons why she likes Shintani kun... As her feelings for him grow there is no pressure on her to take relationship any further. She thinks about she and her mother have created healthy lives in Shimo Kitazawa and thinks that they could have done it together as a family if her father was still alive. This thought saddens her...
Shintani kun invites Yocchan to his apartment and to her surprise his stereo is smaller than she thought but the kitchen is well used and the floor is shining. He kisses her but refuses to take things further because she is not yet ready. He assures her that he is a 'beast' but he wants to give her time. Yocchan visits the family home in Meguro for the last time with her mother and even though there is an oppressive atmosphere they do some cleaning. They decide to eat curry on the way home at a favourite local restaurant and then at the last minute as they are locking the doors they both decide at the same time to get Yocchan's father's photograph from the piano. They have family photographs at the apartment in Shimo Kitazawa but this is the only photograph they have of him on his own. They burn some incense and light some candles to go with the photograph and in this way feel they have brought his spirit home to live with them..
Yocchan has another dream in which she goes back to the Meguro home but all of the furniture has been taken away for a new family to move in. The phone rings and when she picks it up it is her father. She asks him if he loves them but there is no reply. She tells him that they have taken his photograph. She realizes that he wanted to call them when he died. She wakes up and sees her mother sleeping. She has the feeling that they managed to get the photograph just in time. Yocchan then gets another visit from Nakanishi san. Yocchan thanks her for visiting he father's grave but she says she has been busy. Instead she has brought a gift. It is a purse with some salt in it which a friend who is knowledgeable about the spirit world has given her. She tells Yocchan to take it with her when she goes to visit the forest where her father died and when she goes to visit his grave. No doubt this is the last time that she will see her Yocchan thinks when she leaves.
Yocchan goes to a 70s bar with Shintani kun that looks like it has been designed by some drunken Gaudi. There is no change in their relationship. They meet Yocchan's mother who goes home early so that they can enjoy their date together. Her mother goes to Meguro and brings her giant TV set to Shim Kita. Inside herself Yocchan feel si something that is waiting and she is not sure what it is. It might be a miniature of what killed her father. When she gets home her mother is in front of the giant TV. She is watching a movie starring Matsuda Yusaku... Yocchan feels there is some kind of hint there. It was a favourite movie of her mother's and her father took her to see it when she was young.
Michiyo san gets a fever and Moriyama san comes to help out at the restaurant. Yocchan realises that she is not ready yet to fill Michiyo san's shoes. She can barely cope with the demands of the job. Shintani kun reassures her. He tells her that he can't wait any longer and asks her to come home with him They have sex as soon as they get there and then he makes her tea. She goes home in a taxi but can't stop crying. She fears that it won't last and that it isn't real love. She tells him they can't go out together for a while and that she needs time. She asks her mother about her relationship with Shintani kun and she says they just look like friends who have slept together... They do not look like people who would marry each other. Yocchan tells her mother about the woman from Ibaraki and about her plan to visit the forest where her father died so she can say some prayers. Her mother refuses to go with her. She won't prayer for the other woman. Her mother has also been seeing dreams...
Yocchan has lots to do to get ready to go to France but just can't get motivated. She decides to visit Ibaraki that day as the weather is fine. At the station, however, she feels like she has forgotten something. She thinks of calling Shintani kun but calls Yamazaki san instead. She is crying on the phone and he as he is by coincidence already at Tokyo station he agrees to drive to Ibaraki and meet her there. She feels good again and realises that she likes Yamazaki more than Shintani kun. But Yamazaki is 45 years old and he is married. When they get to Ibaraki the weather is fine and Yamazaki san feels that Imo (his nickname for Yocchan's father) will enter Nirvana. They go to the suicide spot in the forest in Yamazaki san's Mini Cooper. It is a deserted area with a dirt road and only a few houses. The ride is very bumpy... The bodies were found by a book illustrator and Yocchan and her mother were grateful for their kindness at the time.
The branches on the road make visibility difficult. When they come to the spot, they decide to bury the charm they have brought in the ground. Yocchan is amazed that Yamazaki san has a shovel in his boot. She also buries her father's mobile phone which is in pieces after her mother stamped on it. Yamazaki san recognizes it and asks what happened to it. She explains about her mother's anger... It turns out that Yamazaki san was divorced two years earlier. His wife left him for a younger man. She wanted to have a baby. Yocchan is happy to hear this news but feels that he has probably already met someone else. Yamazaki san's life has changed a lot in the last two years with the death of his best friend and his divorce. He tells Yocchan how different she is to her parents always thinking of others before herself. She feels grateful for his kind words. Yocchan tells him that she likes him but he warns her against having feelings for him because she is still grieving. They debate about whether to go to the aquarium that he father loved but decided to go another time. Yocchan realises that she probably won't see Shintani kun for a long time. It wasn't a mistake but she wants to begin a new life. She says goodbye to the Re Riyan-Shintani period of her life.
Back in Tokyo, Yamazaki san treats Yocchan to soba at a very expensive restaurant. He asks her if she has spoken about him to her mother? She says yes. She talks about not going home and he warns her again. She realises that he has known her since she was a child and that that is probably still how he sees her. He tells her that her father had stomach cancer but refused to go to the hospital. She is shocked but thinks that her father probably told her mother. Yamazaki san asks her why she likes him and why she wants to sleep with him. She explains and he accepts. It is different to being with Shintani kun. Shintani kun was more practiced in the ways of sex whereas Yamazaki had just had sex with the same woman. Yocchan feels better having sex with Yamazaki san because he sees the 'real her'. She takes a taxi back home and they agree not to meet until she comes back from France. The only thing that she asks is that he doesn't start living with someone else. he can have sex with them but she would like to see how they feel when she gets back. She gets out of the taxi near the Shimo Kita station and walks home looking at the shops and reflecting on the life that she has made there and the people that she has met. She feels that this is her home town. She is sad that the sakura tree will be cut down for the new building but she will carry the memory of it inside her like she carries inside her her father's DNA.
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