Director Kiyoshi Kurosawa has a unique way of creating films that stick to a central theme on such a base level that actual plot details and dialogue are rendered completely secondary to maintaining overall tone. In Bright Future Kurosawa tackled the theme of generation gaps and the conflicts they can cause—more specifically, the idea that the older generation needs to know when to step out of the way so the younger generation can take over, even if they don’t quite understand their methods. Like his previous work, the film uses symbolism and atmosphere to drive home the point, but does so in a way that it never seems confusing or pretentious.

Warning: possible spoilers

Yuji Nimura (Joe Odagiri) has always been able to see the future in his dreams. They’ve always been bright and brimming with hope, but recently they’ve stopped completely. He works with his friend Mamoru Arita (Tadanobu Asano) as a part-time employee at an oshibori laundry. Their boss, Mr. Fujiwara is a well-meaning sort. He likes his two young employees, and sees a great future ahead of them at his company. One day he offers both of them full-time jobs. Yuji can’t seem to decide if he wants the responsibility a full-time job brings so he keeps asking Mamoru what he’s going to do. Mamoru simply tells Yuji “Trust your dreams.” When Yuji reminds him his dreams stopped a long time ago it becomes evident that was the point of the advice.

Mr. Fujiwara decides to pay both of them a visit at Mamoru’s apartment to give them some sage advice about goals and how they should be spending their youth, but loses his train of thought when he remembers a ping pong match is being televised. He sits up clapping and cheering at the TV as Yuji looks on in disgust. Mr. Fujiwara then notices the Mamoru’s pet jellyfish and asks if it will sting. Yuji attempts to warn him that its poison is deadly but Mamoru stops him and simply watches on as his boss dangles his hand in the tank, only to snatch it out before getting stung. Later we see Mamoru on his roof calling Yuji to give him the jellyfish, saying it’s time to move on. When he delivers the pet he tells Yuji he’s come up with a signal for him. When he points his thumb toward his chest, that’s “wait”. When he points his finger forward, that’s “go ahead”.

The next day at work Mr. Fujiwara confronts Mamoru about the jellyfish incident after discovering it was poisonous and Mamoru abruptly quits. That night Yuji is restless. He visits his hangouts but they’re closed. He decides he needs to go visit Fujiwara under the pretext of taking a borrowed CD back, but when he arrives he grabs a metal pipe from a pile of trash and barges in the front door. When he goes upstairs he sees Mr. and Mrs. Fujiwara dead on the floor already. Mamoru had gotten there first and killed them, probably somehow knowing Yuji would have. Mamoru is quickly arrested and offers up a full confession, ending any chance he had of ever getting out of prison alive.

Yuji is deeply hurt and confused after losing Mamoru to prison. Mamoru seems unaffected, however, spending most of their visits obsessing over how Yuji is caring for the jellyfish (they had been gradually acclimating it to fresh water). Yuji isn’t listening though. He informs Mamoru he’s simply going to wait for his release when they can do all of this together. But Mamoru yells at him, telling him if that’s his plan than he’ll never speak to him again. After a final unproductive talk with his estranged father (Tatsuya Fuji), Mamoru hangs himself in his cell, making sure he first wraps himself in metal wire with his finger pointing forward—a final “go ahead” to his friend.

Yuji is upset about his last conversation with Mamoru and in a fit of anger he knocks over the jellyfish tank, allowing the jellyfish to fall through a crack in his floorboards to the water below. Miraculously it survives. He sees it glowing as it meanders off into the river. We later see Mamoru’s father Shinichiro meeting Yuji after the funeral. Shinichiro is desperate to understand his son better. Yuji gives him some much-needed insight on why he believes Mamoru committed the murders and in-turn Shinichiro unwittingly relays the “go ahead” message from Mamoru. Yuji decides to stick with Shinichiro who takes him on as an assistant at his recycling and repair shop.

Later Yuji becomes obsessed with the jellyfish loose in the river, haphazardly dumping batches of brine shrimp into the water for it. We eventually see Mamoru’s spirit show up to sabotage the shrimp incubators, a final act to help Yuji move on with his life. He doesn’t take the hint though and throws a little tantrum. Shinichiro yells at him and tells him to see the reality around him � his reality, but Yuji just runs away. After a few days of moping his sister gets him a job at her office performing menial tasks like making copies and vacuuming the floors. He meets a group of rowdy teenagers at the arcade who are all wearing blinking headsets and Che Guevara t-shirts. It’s probably important to mention at this point (because I missed it the first time) that between the blinking headsets and the music playing at the arcade, the teenagers and jellyfish have a lot in common. Anyway, they immediately become enamored with him. He becomes the pied piper of their little group and helps them break into his office to steal some petty cash. Unfortunately when they make their getaway they gleefully go their own way against his advice and all but him are caught by the police. At a crossroads, Yuji must decide which path to take in life: the one handed over to him by the previous generation or a new path which even his dreams forsee as being rife with uncertainty and struggle, yet also brings the possibility of the bright future he used to dream about.

Bright Future is a brilliant comment on generational shifts. The old generation always wants to hang on to their ideals. They see everything they’ve built up as something to be stepped into by the younger generation, making the future nothing more than a continuation of the past—their past, their future. In the film Fujiwara and Shinichiro are symbols of that generation that’s still hanging on, trying to influence the next to continue on in their place. They try desperately to understand the younger generation without actually accepting the change they inherently represent. It shouldn’t go unnoticed that Shinichiro runs a recycle and repair shop, clinging to old junk that should probably be thrown away. At one point an assistant quits telling him, “I’m sorry. To be honest there’s no future in this.” Although overly blunt, it’s probably a very true assessment. Near the end of the film Shinichiro sees all the jellyfish escaping Tokyo to swim out to sea and asks Yuji, “Are they abandoning us?” When Yuji tells him he believes they’ll be back some day Shinchiro says “I can’t wait that long! I’ll be dead by then!” Youth (represented by the jellyfish) are constantly abandoning past ideals in order to move on to new things the older generation can’t quite understand. Depending on age, everyone’s future is a different one. It makes sense that people are protective of their own, but in the end that sentiment needs to be pushed aside to make way for something new.

In an interview Odagiri claimed that he never really got a handle on how to play Yuji, and just tried to get through it as best he could. Ironically that confusion is probably what helped him nail the character in the first place. In any event, his performance—coupled with an amazing supporting cast and a thoughtful script—makes “Bright Future” one of Kurosawas best efforts to date. And given his catalog, that’s saying a lot.

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Tags: bright future, chiaki kominami, coming of age, hanawa, hideyuki kasahara, joe odagiri, kenichi matsuyama, kiyoshi kurosawa, marumi shiraishi, miyako kawahara, ryo, ryo kase, sakichi sato, sayuri oyamada, tadanobu asano, takashi sasano, tatsuya fuji, tetsu sawaki, yoshiyuki morishita