Blue Spring

There is no point in your life where you are more vulnerable and susceptible to influence than in your youth, your puberty. Blue Spring shows what horrible influences in this time of your life can lead to. The schools gang like system at the center of the movie is already build upon a ridiculously dangerous and irresponsible ritual -which Kujo can only conquer because he doesn’t seem to care for his own wellbeing- and the state of the school building itself stands for the (mental) health and headspace of its students. The decay of the school -each new graffiti covering the worn down walls- represents the students taking one step further to, stretching their necks into the tempting noose hanging at the end of the corridor of adolescence, right before the door to adulthood. Obviously this damage to the building is done by the delinquents themselves, but if you pay attention you can trace it back to barely any adult role model even trying to clean up the school, to truly help the students. The only students who “make it out” of this cruel school are the one who literally gets pulled out of it by his girlfriend and Kujo, who’s flower is the only one that blooms because he and his teacher watered it together and didn’t neglect it. Said flower and the ambiguous mystery of if it ever will bloom is one of the focal metaphors of Blue Spring, as it describes a relatable uncertainty everyone has to face. What will you do with yourself? Fall into a pit of despair and join the Yakuza? Have a mental breakdown and ruin your life over one rash decision? Pursue a legendary status with such obsession, that once you fall you’re already far too high up to catch yourself? Because this is how some of the characters in this film meet their end. All of their bad decisions, which are always underlined by a loud rock soundtrack -piercing through the films usual silence- catch up to them. And upon a second viewing, many of the characters fates are even hinted at early on: Uhto is always surrounded by the color red, foreshadowing his violent death and Yukio -in dreams of being a hero- murders someone who he believes to be evil, because of his savior complex. Blue Spring reeks of rebellion and juvenile irresponsibility when looked at through a shallow lens, but it’s quite literally a story about the opposite: freedom, responsibility and dreams of a brighter future.