‘Ito’ wants us to hear in silence

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YOU CAN’T HEAR MY SILENCE. A pivotal moment in Satoko Yokohama’s Ito (otherwise known as Itomichi, after the Osamu Koshigaya’s same-name novel) sees the eponymous character spout, with much yearning, the one thing she needs from her estranged father, who happens to be a linguistics professor. But how does one do that — hear one’s silence and codify a language when there’s an absence of words?

You’d be forgiven to deem that request unfair. Without communicating how we feel, we can’t expect our loved ones to show up in ways that we need them to. That incapacity to let others in, much more to talk about how we truly feel is familiar to anyone who’s had to bear the brunt of being different. The rural silence, the arid summer air, you almost hear echoes of Elio’s voice: “Is it better to speak or to die?”

Ito Soma (Ren Komai) lives in a listless rural town called Itayanagi, quite literally isolated from her classmates in the city of Aomori. She’s constantly teased for her having a thick Tsugaru accent, a mark of subtle yet scathing otherness that — even in the Philippines where this writer is from — is sadly not uncommon. That leaves Ito mostly taciturn, resorting to mouthing goodbyes to the one person she gets along with in her high school. At home, we see a totally different side to Ito, one that’s headstrong if lacking tact towards her father (Etsushi Toyokawa) and grandmother (Yoko Nishikawa). Despite constant urging and prodigious talent, she’s decided against picking up her shamisen, a Japanese folk instrument with which her late mother was also known to have a good hand. If not with words, notes her father, why not connect with people through music.

There’s a clear sense of dispiritedness in Ito’s daily business, an oft-mistaken sign of teenage angst or dissent. She longs to be heard but lacks the capacity to communicate, at least not in a way that society thinks normal or inobtrusive. When she sees a job listing for a maid cafe, a markedly Tokyo amusement that enterprises on this weird master-slave man-kawaii woman dynamic (a thing that the film, luckily, refuses to just brush aside), Ito gets flushed with a wave of curiosity. With caution, she applies.

And so begins Ito‘s deftly written story; it shows a woman coming to terms with identity in a society that, like the extraterrestrials in They Live, subliminally imposes homogeneity. Why trouble paving a rough path when it’s so easy to be normal like everyone else? It’s a theme that applies, too, to the film’s setting. Aomori is a bit of a time capsule, a far cry from the First World-ness of better-known sites like Tokyo or Osaka. Its development, along with other prefectures in the Tohoku region, puts it at a crossing of customs and modern change, and it isn’t always that we favor the former.

Ito’s entire journey, to put it quite simply, is about forsaking one’s self-effacing tendencies if it means killing your own unique identity. Yokohama’s poised and graceful direction does so without hammering in its themes and messages, culminating in a beguiling shamisen solo where Ito, without words, finally lets out what she’s kept inside.

That scene left such an affect on Geoff and I that we decided to visit Aomori, along with other places in Tohoku, ourselves. We went, without giving much thought of the heat (a mistake), in the summer. The weather was kind enough that there was ample breeze and nary the kind of sweltering, stroke-prone heat that plagued local news. Our mission? Journey to off-the-beaten paths, eat like locals, and come home with full bellies and even fuller souls. I’d say that happened pretty much everyday during our nine-day excursion, but our day trip to Aomori had us particularly spellbound.

We had one destination in mind: the Takayama Inari Shrine, a luscious expanse housing a thousand torii gates that slinked uphill to perhaps the most breathtaking view I’ve seen thus far. But as if by kismet, on our way to Takayama we came up to the city of Tsugaru, the birthplace of the shamisen. We took ourselves on a side quest to the Tsugaru Shamisen Hall, a quaint one-floor establishment that showcased the history of the instrument and live performances. Browsing through the available exhibitions, I’d projected a mind image of Ito spending her day-off buying cute shamisen trinkets here.

To fuel up for Takayama, we visited a nearby hole-in-the-wall restaurant whose name is written in pretty complex kanji (at least at our level) I wouldn’t even dare Romanizing it here. But the food was great, and even better was the oba-chan that cooked every single meal we ordered on the spot. As a tribute to the film Ito I opted for a generous helping of the restaurant’s omu-rice, which tasted incredible.

Not to sound hyperbolic, but I’ve got no problems saying that this trip is one of my favorite trips I’ve gone on — ever. I had great food, great views, and great company (it was Geoff’s first time traveling with my parents!). All because we watched this one film off of JFF Theater, an online platform offered by a film fest we’ve always wanted to go to. Maybe that’s our next trip.