In a Grove (Part 1)

Original story by Akutagawa Ryūnosuke (1892-1927)

A collection of testimonies, each contradicting the next, through which the author plumbs the depths of the human psyche. In the years since it was published, many theories have been proposed to explain the inconsistencies, but the truth of the matter remains hidden in the grove.

The Story of a Film Circle Member

On a Rooftop was the talk of the town before it was ever screened. Rumours swirled about the passionate, drawn-out kissing scene between the two leads, which was supposedly a torrid affair even by the circle’s hardboiled standards. That got people talking, and on the day of the premiere during the campus festival the queue snaked all the way out the door.

There was a reason the rumours spread so widely.

From the moment cameras started rolling until the lights dimmed at the screening, the movie was produced in absolute secrecy. No one in the circle had received so much as a glimpse of the script, and so not a soul knew what was being filmed or where. That’s why it was impossible to go watch the shoot. There wasn’t even an advance screening. We only had the broad outline of the story.

It was only natural to assume that, with all that secrecy, they must have been planning something special. The more you try to hide something, the harder people will work to uncover it. So someone managed to get a peek during the editing process and started spreading the rumours. When you think about it, rumours are much more effective at advertising than putting up posters.

Just to be clear, it wasn’t me that did it.

From my point of view, that last scene was just dumbfounding. Probably even more so, if you were one of the people who worked on it.

The whole thing was just awful. Both the film, and the people who made it.

I have no idea what Uyama, the director, was thinking; and I don’t know what Hasegawa and Watanabe were thinking going along with it.

Neither of the actors showed up to the premiere.

Just Uyama.

The shoots must have been a bloodbath. But Uyama sowed those seeds himself. The plan he came up with was downright immoral. Two guys and one girl, filming practically behind closed doors: two of them going out, and the third person an old flame. Of course they’d fight. They ought to fight. In fact in my opinion they all should have beat each other to death.

I remember Uyama was standing by the film projector in the darkened auditorium.

It was a full house, and of course there was a stir when the kissing scene came on. I wonder what Uyama was feeling as he listened to them cheer. But how can you ever hope to understand what goes through the head of a guy who makes his lover make out with her ex, and films the whole thing? I can see why a lot of the younger members idolize him as the Fiend of Filmmaking, but that stuff is not to my taste at all.

What was it like, during those sessions those three spent filming by themselves?

I guess the truth lies in the grove.

Not that I really want to know what it is.

The Story of Saitō Shūtarō

I saw On a Rooftop.

Hasegawa, the actress, had her charms, but otherwise the movie was uninteresting. If not for my meager acquaintance with Uyama I would never have gone to see such pitiful stuff. I put in an appearance, only to find it all a waste of my time.

I first met Uyama on the night of the Ichijōji Cup. The Ichijōji Cup is an all-night mahjong session, held at the boarding house where a friend by the name of Nagata has his residence.

I found Uyama to be a self-flagellating, unworthy man. He refused liquor, claiming that it would dull his senses, yet he lost miserably all the same. I explained to him in minute detail how he came to lose, yet he would only scratch his head and shrug. Everything he did, everything he said, exposed the poverty of his soul from top to bottom. Yet what I despised the most in him was the way he seemed to revel in his own contemptibleness.

Whenever there was a lull in the action, I would engross myself in writing in my traveling study. I always walk around with a bundle of papers, as you see here, sinking into contemplation at every spare moment. Uyama expressed great interest in this. I inquired as to why this was so, and he told me that he made movies in his circle, and was in the habit of jotting down ideas in his notebook. He was quite vocal about asking for opinions about his ideas. In the course of our discussion he came up with a story about a man and a woman who by chance run into one another on a rooftop. I remember the obscene smirk on his face, like a conniving merchant in a period drama.

It was I who gave him the filming location.

He told me that he was a perfectionist about the set. Once, he boasted, he made a heroic effort to sneak onto Battleship Island, though as his attempt ended in failure I cannot say there was anything heroic about the matter. In any case, as he sought a backdrop for his idea I recommended he use that rooftop. The boarding house in which I reside is in a neighbourhood bordering the Philosopher’s Walk, and beside it is a concrete apartment building about thirty years old. Its rooftop is a dreary place, which Uyama greatly found to his liking. I have snuck up there on several occasions in order to grill mackerel. The taste of grilled mackerel beneath a lofty autumn sky is truly exquisite.

As I recall, the filming took place from the end of September until about the end of October.

I remember the day they came marching into my apartment.

Uyama’s foolish cavorting resembled a top strung up in the air, spinning uselessly. It was quite apparent in his grating display that he was enjoying himself very much, to the point that it almost gladdened the heart. Here was a truly sinful man. But he was at least consistent, which alone of all his traits I cannot fault.

The two actors were there as well.

Watanabe was a morose, brooding fellow, a lone-wolf type, and my impression of him was far more favorable than my opinion of Uyama.

I find it difficult to find the words to speak of Hasegawa. She made but little impression on me during that first meeting, but when I watched the movie...well. Only a bald-faced liar would deny the charm of the girl on screen. And yet she had seemed so ordinary on our first meeting. Perhaps it has to do with the fact that we did not exchange words then, but that is hardly sufficient to explain it. What was it that made her look so ravishing on the screen? You could come up with many reasons to explain it: the camera angle, the director, her skill as an actress. But I find each of those explanations too simple to be convincing.

The woman on the screen looked to me like an entirely different person.

The woman standing in my dim doorway that day in September, smiling but otherwise saying nothing, had seemed no more than a quiet, utterly ordinary girl.

The Story of a Devotee of the Director

Director Uyama is an incredible man. He is the master of my soul.

Compared to him I am but a lowly worm. No, lower than a worm: garbage, rubbish, snot, unfit to live. I have been in the circle for only a year, but when I met Uyama I soon realized how incredible he was.

The leadership of our circle consists of the trio of Jōgasaki, Aijima, and Uyama; but Uyama is the most gifted filmmaker of the three. Everyone else talks a big game, but they are all pretenders. Uyama is the only one who truly makes movies.

Filming a movie is a lengthy process, but Uyama never takes shortcuts, and perseveres to the end. Once he has written a script he never changes it: not the scenes, not the lines, not a word. The likes of Jōgasaki and Aijima could never do that. When Uyama writes a script, he already knows exactly what it is he should film. He discards all the rest beforehand, putting only what survives into the script. That is why for Uyama, there simply cannot be anything in his movie that does not follow the script. For this reason he is called an eccentric, a degenerate.

But isn’t that the way things ought to be? We don’t make commercial movies. Nobody orders us to make these movies; there’s no studio to go bankrupt if the schedule is delayed. What is the use of hiding your eccentricity? I find it despicable, the way Jōgasaki and Aijima compromise so nonchalantly. They mock Uyama’s faithfulness to his script, claiming that movies are meant to evolve as they are filmed, and other such half-remembered film theory nonsense… Of course, it’s possible for a film to grow over the course of its filming, if helmed by a great person. But I persist in saying that the movies which those other “directors” make do not grow during their filming. They flail around haphazardly, and whatever happens to come out they claim as their work. Have they no shame?

The ability to film your script exactly as it is written no matter what others may say is proof that Uyama grasps perfectly the movies that he wants to make.

Uyama is constantly thinking about movies, and walks around with a notebook. He is always writing in it, and I believe that he can see playing on its pages the movies that he ought not to be making. So he discards them, and keeps discarding, and discards some more, and when he is done discarding he films what remains.

I wanted to assist him with this movie. I would only be mocked by the higher-ups if I tried to make my own movie, anyways. But Uyama said that he was making a two-hander, that he didn’t need anyone else, only the two leads and himself. It was a disappointment to hear this.

But he has talked to me many times about On a Rooftop.

I remember that he told me that the value of that film lies on the outside. That it lies on this side of the camera, this side of the screen.

I didn’t understand what he meant.

The Story of a Friend of the Lead Actress

I’ve known Hasegawa since freshman year.

A lot of people say that Naoko is a totally different person when she’s on the screen. Most of the time she seems so nondescript and ordinary, but when she’s in a movie she becomes so glamorous. Now I’m not like trying to badmouth her or anything, but Naoko’s the type of person who has really big swings. Her highs are really high and her lows are really low. I mean, most of the time she’s low. If that’s all you filmed, you couldn’t use the footage for anything.

But this Uyama guy turns into a fiend when he’s filming Naoko. I mean, yeah, they’re lovers, but it’s kind of scary how intense he gets. He just keeps filming and filming, and he doesn’t let up until he catches Naoko exactly at her highest point on camera. I don’t think a normal person could do something like that. Without Naoko, Uyama can’t exhibit his prowess, and without Uyama, Naoko can’t be glamorous. When you think about it that way, I guess you could call them the perfect couple, but...it just seems, like, claustrophobic, and kinda gross you could say. I don’t really like it.

The Naoko in the movies is basically something Uyama created, but I get the feeling that Naoko’s starting to lose sight of the difference between the movie Naoko and the real Naoko. It’d probably be going a little too far to say she’s getting full of herself. She told me when she was filming that movie that she wanted to break up with Uyama. She didn’t say much about why, but I think she looks down on him a little bit. Then again, if you ask me, the whole reason she’s so confident now, the reason she gets all this praise now, is because of Uyama. She couldn’t see that the ladder she’s climbed to get up here was a special ladder, and now that she’s done climbing she just wants to throw it away.

But what can you do? Uyama is the type of guy who ruins whoever he’s with. He’s earnest enough, sure, but he’s also twisted. And no amount of earnestness can fix that.

But it really started with Watanabe, you know?

Everyone knows that he asked Naoko out at Kenrokuen during their first year.

They were there because the film circle was having a retreat there. I’d gotten separated from Naoko and was trying to find her, but apparently she and Watanabe had met up and were really hitting it off in conversation. Come to think of it, I did see Uyama wandering around with a camera. Maybe he was looking for Naoko too, but I guess Watanabe beat him to the punch.

But in the end, Watanabe lost Naoko to Uyama.

This might just be speculation, but I don’t think that Watanabe tried that hard to keep Naoko from leaving him. It’s not like he didn’t really like her or anything like that, that’s just the way he is. Whenever you talk to him, it’s almost like he thinks that if he stays quiet and waits long enough, you’ll eventually come around to his side. You could be generous and call him the strong and silent type, but I think that he’s spoiled, in a way. Like he’s protecting his dignity, or his philosophy of life, you know? That’s why he’s so stubborn. He pretends not to care. He always looks indifferent. And that’s never gonna win against a freak like Uyama.

So, even after they broke up, the three of them hung out together, went out eating together, right?

When I found out, all I could think was, what the hell is wrong with you, Watanabe!? He thinks looking indifferent all the time is cool. He’s like that with everything, so Uyama must’ve sweet-talked him into appearing in that movie.

So, the movie.

I can’t believe anyone would film something like that. It’s absolutely sick.

A love story with your girlfriend and her ex, and using dialogue from their actual conversations? I can’t imagine what Uyama was thinking, making something like that. And the actors; I can understand Naoko, but what I really want to know is why Watanabe agreed to appear in it. Wouldn’t that just be really painful? He could have said that it was an invasion of his privacy, but he didn’t. That’s Watanabe for you, though: that sort of thing is unimportant to him, compared to friendship.

The premiere was a success, but mostly because of that final scene.

Neither Naoko nor Watanabe attended the screening, and Uyama didn’t say a word the whole time.

Ever since then it’s felt like it’s impossible to talk about that movie.

To this day no one knows how that movie ended up being made, or what happened during its filming.

The Story of Watanabe Shin’ichi, the Actor

When Uyama approached me about that movie in a Shinshindō Café, my first reaction was astonishment.

At the movie being about what it was.

Two former lovers meet on a rooftop, and as they reminisce about those shared days gone by, they begin to fall for each other again. But when I flipped through the script, I quickly realized that the couple was based on me and Hasegawa. Uyama had used our memories to write his script, and basically he wanted us to play ourselves.

That’s a hell of a request, I thought to myself.

But when I asked for the details, I realized that he was serious. He may be a lying, jealous masochist that everybody hates, but when it comes to the things that he wants to make he’s dead serious. Letting me read a script like that must have meant it was important to him. He was going to make that movie by any means necessary, and it was that devotion of his that sold me. He said to me, “I want to make the best movie that I possibly can,” and I believed him.

Besides, I don’t think I’ll ever make another movie with Uyama again. Thinking about that does make me a little wistful. We’ve had our times, just the two of us making movies. I figured I might as well go out with one last hurrah to make things easier. And really, I didn’t care anymore about whatever quarreling was going on between him and Hasegawa.

That’s why I decided to perform in On a Rooftop.

Uyama caught a lot of flak in the circle for saying he was going to make that movie, but since me and Hasegawa had said we were okay with it, none of those people really had a leg to stand on. It might be hard for them to believe, but we didn’t have any objections to acting together. We’d already been broken up for a while. Afterwards I got along with Uyama and Hasegawa like I always had, which everybody in the circle was aware of. I’m not the type of guy who gets bent out of shape over a petty quibble like that.

Whatever was written in the script, I wasn’t going to let it shake me. Now that wasn’t what Uyama had in mind for me. I have no doubt that he had specifically chosen me and Hasegawa to be in the film so that he could film us being dragged back into the past, overlaying the movie on top of reality.

But I wasn’t about to play into his hands.

That thought cheered me up.

After coming to an agreement at Shinshindō we shook hands. I doubt he understood why I let out a laugh. This movie was going to be a battle between Uyama—who was trying to drag the past out from me—and myself—who was only acting as if the past was being dragged out from me.

Filming began at the end of September.

The set was on the roof of an old concrete apartment building by Philosopher’s Walk. It was a terribly dreary place. So many weeds were growing out of the cracks in the concrete that it looked like a grassy field. There was a spherical water tank, and in the evenings the whole rooftop was stained golden by the setting sun. Uyama piled up rusty hunks of metal and concrete blocks to create a space for filming. He seemed to be enjoying himself quite a lot. I helped out, remembering my freshman days.

But the shoot didn’t go as planned.

The reason was simple: Hasegawa kept making things difficult.

She wouldn’t listen to Uyama, arguing with his directions and refusing to do retakes. When it came to do a take she’d start to complain about the script. She knew perfectly well that Uyama wasn’t going to compromise there, and in the end she’d grudgingly do as he told her, so it was clearly a waste of time. But she kept at it, squabbling with Uyama and forcing Uyama into big detours, almost like it was some sort of ritual.

Yet Uyama never got angry. If he was patient long enough his view would eventually prevail, so maybe it was for the best. On the other hand, I was pretty sick of it.

It happens, petulant actors and directors can bring filming and editing to a screeching halt. I’ve seen it myself on many occasions. But Hasegawa took it way too far, and Uyama just played along with her diva tantrums like he was her slave. It was so over the top that it was comical. Maybe they were just playing around. If they were, I could only shake my head at how shameless they were.

Hasegawa irritated me a lot, but on the other hand working with Uyama was a delight. As far as filming movies was concerned, he was a consummate professional.

He explained the scenes we were about to perform as clearly if he’d already shot them. He never fumbled around once the take had started. He didn’t get stressed over decisions. He simply walked forward with almost alarming precision, as if the path was marked before him. It was like he was piecing Lego blocks together according to an instruction booklet. It sounds dismissive when I put it like that, but you can’t always just leave everything to passion and fly by the seat of your pants. There was something enjoyable about the simplicity of Uyama’s style.

It was autumn, so the weather was perfect, and it felt wonderful being up there on the roof.

There’d be the occasional rain shower, but for the most part the days were pleasantly sunny. A splendid ginkgo tree towered beyond the rusted handrail, and as the shoot went on their leaves gradually turned a brilliant golden hue. During breaks we would eat together, watching the boughs rustle in the wind. Usually Hasegawa would force Uyama to make the bento boxes. It was a little bit like being on a picnic.

I kept an eye on Hasegawa’s every move.

It must have been hard for me when we broke up, but during the shoot it rankled not being able to remember the way it had felt. I didn’t understand how the pain could have vanished so cleanly. But I thought it was all because she had changed. In the movie, I started thinking back to those days. I kept asking myself why I had fallen in love with her.

One day, she started complaining yet again, and sat down on the concrete blocks. Unable to hold back my irritation, I snapped at her, which just made things worse. Eventually she ordered Uyama to get some ginkgo nuts for her to eat. It was plain that she was saying it just to say it. But Uyama dutifully went downstairs.

I leaned over the railing, watching Uyama walking around hunched over beneath the ginkgo tree. I wanted to ask him if getting to capture her on film was worth all this. What drove him to go this far, all to make some amateur film? I’m sure he wouldn’t have been happy to hear it described like that.

I realized suddenly that Hasegawa was standing beside me, leaning on the handrail.

“Why are you being so selfish? Are you enjoying using Uyama like this?” I asked.

Hasegawa snorted. “I mean, he’s doing it because he wants to.”

She leaned over the railing dangerously, trying to pluck a golden leaf from a nearby branch. Seeing her very nearly lose her balance, I quickly grabbed her by the shoulders and pulled her back. She crushed the golden leaf in her hand, then said, “What’s it to you anyways?”

I noticed then that Uyama was standing at the foot of the tree, looking up at me. It was hard to tell from his expression whether he was laughing or crying. He sort of looked like a little kid. For some reason I suddenly felt terribly sad. I wanted to say something to him.

“How come you just let us break up like that?” Hasegawa said unexpectedly. “You should have tried to stop me.”

“I would never do something so pathetic,” I answered.

Hasegawa sat back down on top of the concrete blocks. She placed the crumpled leaf between her lips. As she stroked her own hair, her face looked tired.

What was she up to?

Maybe it was nothing.

But her words lingered in my mind. Maybe, just maybe, she wanted us to give it one more try. No, I had to be reading too much into it. I no longer had any feelings for her. I was merely acting…

I kept on thinking about it.

As the camera filmed us gazing at each other, exchanging false lines based on true memories, I began to feel that the woman I had used to know was there beneath the skin. It was only a faint feeling. Just as I began to use this to revive those memories, the scene ended, and immediately Hasegawa returned to her usual self. My frustration only grew, and that led me to that final scene.

It was all because of the rainbow.

If Uyama really had sussed out that that rainbow was where my memories with Hasegawa had begun, and that it would drag me into the past—if he really had planned that out, I can only give him my respect.

The end of October had already arrived, and when it rained the air was unpleasantly chilly.

The shoot trudged along, and at last all that remained was the final scene. I hear that scene has become pretty notorious. Of course, I probably overdid it. Even just reading the script, I wasn’t sure if I could go through with it.

But spending every day seeing how passionate Uyama was, I started to feel that it was okay, that I really could do it. People in the circle were always talking, but once I started filming with Uyama, all of those feelings of embarrassment went away. But the most important thing, the reason that I was so calm and confident going into that scene, was how calm Hasegawa was. Filming that scene was nothing to her. And if she was like that, I couldn’t let myself be the only one hesitating. I would no longer only contend with Uyama’s schemes, I was going to contend with Hasegawa as well.

Uyama wanted to shoot the last scene under a real rainbow. But he couldn’t get one to show up. That was only natural. Rain doesn’t guarantee that a rainbow is going to show up. It wasn’t even a given that it would come out well on film. Nevertheless Uyama persisted.

Now that I’d come this far, I was planning to accommodate Uyama’s stubbornness to the end, but Hasegawa said that she was done being patient. “Even if there isn’t a rainbow, couldn’t we just say that there was one?”

I agreed, this time logic was on her side. Uyama managed to talk her down a couple of times, but I could sense that she was reaching the end of her tether.

And then the day came.

We filmed a part of the scene where we were talking in the rain, and then took a breather to see how the weather would turn out. Hasegawa used a towel to wipe the raindrops from her forehead. Uyama looked up at the sky, almost like he was praying. I stood by the guardrail, smoking a cigarette and looking at the pall of rain that covered the town.

“If we don’t get a rainbow within two hours, I’m done. You two can finish the movie by yourselves!” Hasegawa announced.

But as it turned out, there really was a rainbow. Uyama’s persistence had paid off. It was so perfect that I was shocked. Uyama started barking out orders, and Hasegawa stood up.

“A rainbow,” I said.

“I hate rainbows,” she said, looking at her feet.

“Why?”

“They’re scary.”

“Really? Rainbows usually make people happy.”

“It’s kind of like there’s a huge monster striding across the sky.”

I reached out from beneath my umbrella into the light drizzle and took her hand.

At that moment, that rainy day in Kenrokuen appeared vividly in my mind.

I remembered now that she’d told me in that garden she hated rainbows.

I’d been holding an umbrella, trying to talk to her. I was buffeted by emotions: by an unbridled giddiness, and also by an opposing, unbearable misery. I emerged out onto a raised plateau where ancient pine trees grew. She was slowly walking through the drizzle as if in a reverie, not even bothering to open her umbrella. Raindrops rolled down through her hair like glass beads. It was almost like a movie. I looked on, as she passed between the pine trees, parted the gentle curtain of rain, and crossed over time and space, landing here on this autumn rain-slicked rooftop to stand beside me.

I’m not going to explain why I fell in love with her. I’m not sure that I could, and in any case the words of a person in love don’t mean anything to anyone else. You’d be much better off watching the movie Uyama made. That is where her charm lies. And that is the only place that she exists. I really don’t feel anything for her now. Where did the girl who charmed me go? Why does she exist only in Uyama’s movie? I don’t hate Uyama for going out with her. I hate him for spiriting her away into his movie.

Yet on the other hand, I figure that this is all in my head.

Maybe she never existed in the first place. I’d tried going out with her, but in the end we never really opened up to one another. I think I was only ever watching a hazy movie version of her that I’d created on my own. If that was true, then she hadn’t been whisked away by Uyama into the movie: I’d only ever been looking at her image on a screen from the very start.

But at that moment, on that rooftop, there was no doubt in my mind that it was the Hasegawa of the past who was standing before me. Her dripping bangs swayed as she looked up at me with glistening eyes. I had found her, here in the middle of Uyama’s movie. And that meant that I had lost to Uyama.

The scenes still play out in my head.

She looks up at me from beneath the umbrella.

Raindrops fall from the edge of the umbrella, wetting her hair.

Beyond her I see the buildings, soaked in rain.

The soft drizzle pitter-patters on the leaves of the ginkgo tree.

A sliver of blue sky peeks through a gap in the clouds.

A rainbow.

Golden sunlight gently shines on her face.

And her eyes gaze at me.

Dazed, I can hardly move—

She abruptly leans over and kisses me, long and slow.

But the moment Uyama yelled, “Cut!” the movie ended, and she vanished like smoke before my eyes.

Whispering simply, “The End,” she departed, leaving me alone inside the screen.