Worth: $18.00
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Cast:
Ryuichi Sakamoto
Intro:
There is an achingly beautiful sadness in this minimalist, black and white document of Ryuichi Sakamoto’s final performance.
There is an achingly beautiful sadness in this minimalist, black and white document of Ryuichi Sakamoto’s final performance. There’s no audience – just the renowned composer, a grand piano and a small, hidden film crew. There’s no narration, and only a few words. Made in a state-of-the-art broadcast studio in Tokyo, it’s exquisitely filmed, revealing the many nuanced expressions on Sakamoto’s face.
There is no introduction. We find Sakamoto already at the piano, his back to the camera. His arrangements are melancholy, beautiful, sometimes defiant. His music in a class of its own.
A 2017 film – Ryuichi Sakamoto: Coda – documented the musician restarting his career after cancer. A few years later, he is making Opus, knowing that it’s his swansong. In March 2023, at 71, he passed away. Sakamoto is well known for his soundtracks, and much of this has a soundtrack feel – perhaps the score of a very sad love story. The pieces in Opus have been handpicked from across his career and include music from Merry Christmas, Mr Lawrence (in which he also acted) and The Last Emperor, as well as a reworking of ‘Happy End’ by the Yellow Magic Orchestra (his famed electronic trio).
Helmed by Sakamoto’s son – filmmaker, artist and translator Neo Sora – the camera work is stunning. Just a man and a piano – with no accompaniment or theatrics – is not a recipe for something visually interesting. But this is. The camera slowly closes in on its subject, then shows the hands making delicate, measured moves on the piano. The lens reveals Sakamoto’s moments of frustration. Roughly midway, he speaks quietly to himself: “This is tough, I’m pushing myself.” But he plays on, beautifully.
Sakamoto is not smiling through a facade. This is a bare-bones document of a gifted musician and composer at the end of his life – a musician still capable of creating extraordinary sounds.
