Prove it's not a chicane. Tappei Kaneko was in a hurry for an interview and barely climbed into the crowded carriage. Part of his jacket got stuck between the doors and he tried to release it. When he got off at the station, a fifteen-year-old girl walked out with him. She grabbed him by the hand and declared him a chicane, a man who harasses in crowded traffic. The young man is being detained. The process begins. Prosecutors demand that he plead guilty and get away with a fine, but the young man stands his ground and claims that he did nothing. The case goes to trial. The parties painstakingly dig into the circumstances of the case and even reconstruct the situation in the car, but the chances of Tappei to win the trial are negligible.
The film is striking above all the depth of detail of the trial. In a seemingly scant case, in which there is no murder, no theft, no rape, but only the fatal touch of a man’s palm to the buttocks of a teenage girl, at first glance, it is difficult to erect the monumental structure of arguments and counterarguments that was built in the film. However, from a single touch grew more than a two-hour film, representing one solid trial. Lawyers immediately tell Tappey that winning the case is almost impossible. On the basis of the testimony of the victim alone, he may be convicted. But Tappei does not give up and, together with the lawyers, tries to consistently build a defense. During the trial, not only Tappei is questioned in detail, but also the victim, whose answers are evaluated with no less bias. Did she see the tikan, did she see where the hand that touched her had gone, was she sure that the detainee was guilty? All these nuances are of fundamental importance for the fate of Tappei. His lawyers even insist on the reconstruction of the scene in the car, where, as they think, prove the impossibility of the guilt of his client. But the state legal machine is inexorable.
In the film, which is a classic court drama, you can see the undisguised reality of modern Japan, where not only harassment in transport becomes commonplace. Traditional, virtually automatic conviction of any suspect in them becomes commonplace. Such a court cannot be called corrupt. This is not about corruption, but about society’s fatigue with the social hell in which it lives. Hell, in which teenagers are dangerous to go on the subway. That is why all cases with the Chicanes tend to close, convicting the accused. The society represented by the judge simply does not intend to listen to the arguments of the defense of the suspect, considering him guilty. Therefore, Tappei has to fight for his reputation not with a particular judge, but with the very state machine that he personifies.
The work of Masayuki Suo, being filmed almost entirely indoors, can not boast of entertainment, but the court decision, unknown to the end of the film, arouses genuine interest in the viewer and makes you carefully follow the vicissitudes of the debates of prosecutors and lawyers.
8 out of 10