Director Tetsuya Nakashima employs a hyper-stylized visual language. The film is drenched in slow motion, pop-art color grading, and a dissonant soundtrack that mixes glitchy electronica with mournful piano. This visual beauty acts as a Trojan horse for the film's ugly themes. We watch children laugh in slow motion while the teacher describes death. We see a boy’s face distorted in a milk carton reflection.
Features a cold, desaturated palette of blues and greys. Confessions.2010
: Confessions was Japan’s official entry for the 83rd Academy Awards and swept the 34th Japan Academy Prize, winning Picture, Director, and Screenplay. We watch children laugh in slow motion while
This prologue sets the stage for a film that is less a "whodunit" and more a "why-did-they-do-it" and "what-happens-next." The film deconstructs the events leading up to the murder and the devastating aftermath through a series of non-linear, first-person narrations. : Confessions was Japan’s official entry for the
Using the blackboard as a visual aid, she explains the Japanese juvenile justice system—how minors under 16 cannot be prosecuted for murder. Since the law will not punish them, she will. She reveals that she has just injected the milk cartons of the two killers with HIV-positive blood drawn from her late husband (a doctor who contracted the virus in Africa).