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House (1977) | Dir. Nobuhiko Obayashi

Nobuhiko Obayashi’s House (1977)

This book that can unfold into a house

Gorgeous little book from artist Zhihui! If you can’t get enough of this gorgeous wee baby, you can buy one for yourself on Etsy 😍

@hope-coffee-and-poetry 😍🥰

“All of my close childhood friends died because of the bomb… so I wanted to write a fantasy with the atomic bomb as a theme.” -  Nobuhiko Obayashi

“Having the atomic bomb as a theme is a serious endeavour - even more so if you were born in Hiroshima in 1938. And yet, if you’ve seen Obayashi’s ‘House’ what you probably remember is the silliness - like the head of the hungry girl who takes one final bite, or the skeleton dance sequence, or the hungry piano. What you might not recall is any serious engagement with the atomic bomb. There’s the World War II backstory that the main character shares with their friends which involves the girl’s aunt who they are about to visit. The aunt loses her only true love in the war. The younger sister, who’s the main character’s mother, gets married. A photo is taken, a flash of light, and then an explosion of the atomic bomb which is on the screen for just two seconds. During the explosion, we hear one of the girls describe it as ‘cotton candy.’ Afterwards there is no more mention or footage of the bomb. In the entire film we only have these two seconds. “The film consists of two halves. The first half establishes the lightness of a new generation, born after the bomb. In a number of interviews, Obayashi has stated his desire to offer a sense of the bomb’s impact on the younger generation. The second half of the film is primarily dedicated to the non-sensical destruction of the girls. If we were to find the exact centre of this film, we would land on what I consider to be the most significant and telling scene. We see the convergence of identities played out in the mirrors: between two generations; between the past and the present; between the dead and the living.  “Part of the absurdity of the bomb that destroyed Hiroshima was its codename, Little Boy. Of course the greater absurdity was the scale of the destruction that happened in an instant - a flash of light, a whole population gone. Tim O’Brien writes that some things are so horrific that truth isn’t sufficient for the truth. The only way to convey it is with fiction so outlandish that it approximates the absurdity of true horror. “In the film, [the cat] Snowflake signals impending doom with a flash of light in her eyes. The first time we see Snowflake’s eyes flash green is when a photo is taken. Seen in this light, the atomic bomb is everywhere in this film.” - Kogonada (Trick or Truth)

ハウス | Hausu | House (1977) dir. Nobuhiko Obayashi

House | Hausu (1977)