MIT Lecture Series Committee

Rated PG-13
130 minutes

view trailer

format: 35mm

Departures (Okuribito) (2008)

Co-sponsored by MISTI (MIT Japan).

Academy Award-winner Departures follows Daigo Kobayashi (Masahiro Motoki), a devoted cellist in an orchestra that has just been dissolved and who is suddenly left without a job. Daigo decides to move back to his old hometown with his wife to look for work and start over. He answers a classified ad entitled Departures thinking it is an advertisement for a travel agency only to discover that the job is actually for a "Nokanshi" or "encoffineer," a funeral professional who prepares deceased bodies for burial and entry into the next life. While his wife and others despise the job, Daigo takes a certain pride in his work and begins to perfect the art of “Nokanshi,” acting as a gentle gatekeeper between life and death, between the departed and the family of the departed. The film follows his profound and sometimes comical journey with death as he uncovers the wonder, joy and meaning of life and living. [www.rottentomatoes.com]

Takita is blessed with actors who move lightly, gracefully within this landscape.
      -- Betsy Sharkey, Los Angeles Times. Read this review.