There's a ghostly quality to Norwegian Wood (2010), as if it's less a film than a ghost story pretending to be a romance. But who is haunting whom? Is it Naoko, unable to cut herself loose from the past, or Watanabe, ever walking the tightrope between memory and desire? Or is it us—all of us—denying that nostalgia is just sorrow with a prettier name.
The movie, much like Murakami's novel, depicts a lengthy dream from which one may not wish to awaken. It is the kind that disconcerts, staying at the threshold of consciousness, slipping one's grasp just as clear comprehension approaches. Tran Anh Hung doesn't just tell a story; he ensnares us within it. His camera lingers too long; his silences stretch too far, crushing time in a way that almost seems brutal.
But something is a bit twisted. Murakami's fiction was packed with the messy, unrefined thoughts of Watanabe, gushing into the chaotic yet poetical tangle of youth, sex, literature, and longing. The silent voice in the film reduces this; it withdraws into something quieter, passive—almost like an observer of his life than the protagonist. Why is he so distant about us? Does it mean, however, that the good, dirty honesty that in the book made him such a near human character in the movie is missing?
There are some peculiarities that really stand out. Midori’s playful vulgarity, which shines so brightly in the novel, feels a bit toned down in the film. It seems to shy away from the book’s absurd humor—the strange blend of pain and nonchalance that these characters have when it comes to love and death. And then there’s the sex. In the book, intimacy is wrapped up in existential weight, but the film presents it in a way that feels almost sterile, stripping away the inner turmoil that made those moments so impactful.
Why does love seem so closely linked to death in this story? Is it because loving someone means giving away parts of yourself that you can never get back? Reiko sings, Naoko listens, and Midori flares up like a flame eager to burn away Watanabe’s sadness. But can joy ever truly overshadow the ache of absence?
The Japan depicted in the film isn’t the one we see in travel brochures or flashy cyberpunk dreams—it’s a Japan filled with wind-swept fields, damp wooden cabins, and a deep sense of loneliness. In this setting, even the cherry blossoms seem hesitant to bloom.
Norwegian Wood doesn’t provide neat resolutions because it understands that some wounds never fully heal. It poses the question: if memory is all we have left of someone, does letting go mean we’re betraying them? And it leaves us with a hard truth we might not want to face—that the past isn’t just behind us; it’s a part of us, always waiting to be remembered.
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