Chinese film is a departure for Takita

On an unseasonably warm October afternoon, Japanese director Yojiro Takita was being interviewed in a hotel in the Wangjing area of Beijing as part of a tightly packed schedule. Just a few hours later, his first Chinese film, Silence of Smoke, was due to premiere.

Takita attributes the opportunity to make the Chinese language film in China to his surprise 2009 Oscar win for Best Foreign Language Film with Departures.

The new movie, adapted from a novella by Dalian-born writer Xin You, was released in domestic theaters on Nov 3.

The tale centers on an experienced pastry baker and his adult son who live in a small town in southern China, played respectively by actors Zhang Guoli and Han Geng.

As the guardian of a cherished family recipe that has been handed down through seven generations, the dedicated baker follows a disciplined routine — rising early in the morning, preparing the ingredients, and meticulously making just two trays of bingjinggao, a delectable rice cake enveloped in a honey-infused coating that appears translucent and enticing.

Despite the long queue outside his store, the baker stubbornly refuses to bake more cakes to increase their income. He even urges his son to leave and locks the door when they reach a crucial stage in the production process. Hurt and angry, the son eventually finds a job at a film and television production studio in another city, gets married, and has a daughter. Years later, after the father's passing, the son uncovers a heart-wrenching secret that explains his father's stubbornness and indifference.

The project was initially launched in 2015, when China's film industry was experiencing an unprecedented expansion, with that year's box office posting a year-on-year increase of 48.7 percent.

After reading the novella sent to him by the producers, Takita says he found the tale's core message about the generation gap between a father and son quite easy to understand from a Japanese perspective.

"In Asian stories, fathers are mostly portrayed as silent and reserved, and they do many things for their children behind the scenes. It is only through the passage of time that people begin to comprehend their fathers. This is distinctive of Asian familial affection," he explains.

During preparations, the director received a suggestion from his art director, who was traveling to Kunming and Tengchong in Yunnan province to identify locations for the shoot.

After seeing the well-preserved residential buildings of Heshun — an ancient town, more than 600 years old — Takita recalls that he was attracted to its traditional lifestyle and beautiful landscapes, and that it was the exact setting he had envisioned for the story.

However, he says, he still had one difficulty to overcome: Bingjinggao as described in the novella does not actually exist.

"It is somewhat difficult to imagine this pastry based solely on the description in the novella. I drew inspiration from wagashi (a traditional Japanese confection) while traveling in historical cities like Kyoto and Kanazawa," recalls Takita.

As Silence of Smoke marks his first movie outside of Japan, he brought the main crew members from Departures to work with him in China. Despite encountering a language barrier and cultural differences, Takita says he was impressed with how efficiently his fellow Chinese crew members worked throughout the shoot, which took place between September and November 2018.

Takita also makes a cameo appearance in the film as an unnamed director. The scene occurs when the son, played by Han, arrives at the film and television studio in search of a new future. He stumbles upon the director sitting behind a monitor, engrossed in the filming of a martial arts movie. When the protagonist approaches to make an inquiry, the director politely makes a "shh" gesture.

With a directorial career spanning more than four decades, Takita says the character symbolizes his passion and love for cinema.

"In this scene, the monitor is focused on the filmmakers, actors and the son on set at the studio. They all appear in this scene because they love movies. I played the part of a director, because I also wanted to be a part of this world, to immerse myself in the essence of filmmaking, and become a guardian of movies," Takita explains with a smile.

As a regular visitor to China over the past decade, both to make the movie and serve as a jury member at two of China's most influential movie events — the Beijing and Shanghai international film festivals — Takita has become more familiar with Chinese filmmakers.

Listing a string of famous directors from Zhang Yimou to Chen Kaige and John Woo, he says their acting and directorial efforts, such as Zhang's early performance in Old Well and Woo's epic war movie Red Cliff, have impressed many Japanese cinemagoers.

Noting that he is also fond of Zhang's 2005 movie Riding Alone for Thousands of Miles, which stars Japan's Ken Takakura, Takita expresses a wish to see more cooperation between Japanese and Chinese filmmakers, highlighting the potential learning and benefits that can be derived from such partnerships.