The 64th Essay: Tora-san, Wish You Were Here (2019, Japan)
Ryoden Kouki Engineering Co., Ltd.
Company Newsletter Series: “How about Taking a Short Break?”
“If you ever find yourself in trouble, call my name into the wind. I’ll come flying to you, wherever I am.”
These words of Tora-san symbolize the existence of a “place of refuge in the heart”—something that continues to support us even after the person who gave us comfort is no longer there.
Tora-san, Wish You Were Here*, the fiftieth film in the Tora-san series, tells the story of Mitsuo, Tora-san’s nephew, and depicts reunions and emotional connections among people reaching important turning points in their lives.
Now fifty years old, Mitsuo reunites with Izumi, his first love from long ago. When his daughter tells him, “For the past three days, it felt as though Daddy had gone somewhere far away,” he realizes that he has been so absorbed in memories of the past that he has lost sight of the present.
Aesop’s fable “The Wild Ass and the Domestic Ass” portrays the dangers of trying to live entirely on one’s own. The wild ass looks down on the domesticated ass for living under another’s protection, but when danger comes, the wild ass has no one to turn to for help.
Perhaps human beings are not meant to live in complete independence. What matters may be having a “place to return to”—family, friends, memories, or something else that can support us emotionally when we face difficult times.
Please read the full text here.
