Q. What did you learn about the people who work in space development as you did research for the film?
The Toho studio is located in the woods, and I’ve always had the image in my mind that films are made by people who work earnestly and steadily in an isolated environment. I thought JAXA’s Tsukuba Space Center had a similar atmosphere.
Space research has not fared well in Japan in the last few years. Public spending has been focused primarily on things that have to do directly with the lives of the public, such as food, energy and education, and the space budget has been cut every year. What’s worse is that R&D is always the first to be cut. In a sense, the film business is the same as the space field - if films disappeared from our lives, nobody would be troubled and there would be no direct impact on people’s lives. So I saw an affinity between space and film: people who are serious about doing something society tends to see as a frill. Q. You said earlier that you were a space-film fan. What was the first space film you saw?My first space film was E.T. I saw it when I was 3 years old. I was very young, but I vividly remember the scene with the flying bicycles. I love "flying" stuff. I love seeing humans fly. I have seen E.T. many times since then, even after I grew up, but the flying bicycles scene still never fails to move me. As you get older, you become less emotional, or the way you are touched changes a bit, but E.T. still touches me in the same way it did when I was three. To me, this is the beauty of the film. Q. Do you prefer stories about humans to alien films?I like space films, but I’m more into films that use space to depict humanity than alien films. E.T. is also a story about people who encounter an alien. Most of all, I’m interested in humans going to space, because their drive to get there is truly amazing. So I’m more interested in the words people would say upon landing on Mars than in the image of a spacecraft landing on the planet. Among all the images collected by the Apollo missions, the picture of a man hitting a golf ball on the Moon’s surface has left me with a much stronger impression than the image of the Moon viewed from lunar orbit. For me, the key is whether human beings have a direct, personal connection with space. I seriously think that if humans can make it to Mars, it may help us break through some of the problems here on Earth.
Q. What attracts you most about space?
It’s the fact that very few people can actually experience it. In today’s world, you can go just about anywhere you want, and you can find any information on the Internet. But in our lives, we will probably never get a taste of how Gagarin felt when he first saw the Earth from space. Space is something that I will never be able to reach but is constantly surprising me with its magnificence - that’s what I like about space.
Q. The films you produced, Confessions (Kokuhaku) and Villain (Akunin), which were released in 2010, depicted a sense of stagnation. How did these films lead you to Space Brothers?
I can produce films only by digging out the frustration or feelings from my everyday life. It’s like my films are extensions of my sensations, so I try to make only films I would like to see as an audience member.
Planning for Space Brothers started on a full scale only after Confessions and Villain were out of theatres. These two films were also shown at overseas film festivals and received a strong response. This indicates that, although they both depicted the sense of stagnation in Japanese society, it is actually a common sensation around the world. And despite the fact that both stories are about horrendous incidents, what they both come down to is family issues, because crimes happen as a result of family problems.
In my opinion, today the family bond has so weakened, parents and children need to make an effort if they want to maintain their relationship. So I wanted to articulate how brothers, who are the closest kin, can help each other live their lives. Furthermore, the feeling of being cooped up is becoming an issue around the world. I thought that to show people breaking through it, we had to set the story in space, a greater stage than the Earth. So these motivations led me to produce Space Brothers.
Q. What do you think of the brothers, Mutta and Hibito?
To me, they are ideal brothers. I think in reality it’s hard to find brothers with such a strong bond. What is great about the older brother, Mutta, and the younger brother, Hibito, is that they were able to pursue their dream of going to space because they had each other. Mutta was able to go to space thanks to Hibito, and Hibito would never have gone to space without Mutta. Neither of them would have been able to make it to space if they had not been brothers - I admire such a relationship.
Q. What would you like to see from JAXA and Japan’s space missions?
Going to space is expensive and requires a national budget. So naturally the significance of going to space should be explained from an academic point of view. However, at the same time, I think that pure desire, the dream or longing to go to space, can be emphasized more strongly.
In the near future, private space travel will become more easily available, increasing the opportunities to travel to space. Given this development, I am interested in how JAXA, as a national space agency, is going to change its approach to space. Large-scale operations depend on national support. If Japan were to launch a human space vehicle, for example, it would greatly change the Japanese people’s view of space. It will bring space closer to the people, and give them a sense that they too may have a chance to go to space someday. Until that happens, people may not truly become involved in and enthusiastic about space affairs. If a time comes when it no longer sounds unrealistic for children to aspire to become astronauts, that would be wonderful.
Q. Finally, could you give a message to people who are going to see Space Brothers.
I imagine that people visit JAXA’s website because they are fond of space. Of course, Space Brothers will be entertaining for those people, but the film can also amuse those who have no interest in space. I would love space fans to bring those people to see the film.
I think that only space fans can generate more space fans. As a space fan myself, I think I was able to use the film to increase the public’s interest in space. To convince people of the beauty of space, I think it is more effective to take them to see a film than to explain in words. Please visit a cinema to see Space Brothers with someone who is not interested in space.
Link: Official Space Brothers Movie Website (Japanese language only)
(Photo:©2012 SBFP)
