MMB Chapter 108 The Night I Heard the Waves
Chapter 108 The Night I Heard the Waves
Chapter 108 The Night I Heard the Waves
The lights in the theater slowly went out, and the previously noisy conversations seemed to be wiped away by an invisible hand, leaving only the faint sound of the projector running and the faint smell of caramel popcorn in the air.
In the darkness, hundreds of eyes were fixed on the still-unlit screen ahead.
The screen lights up.
The movie opens abruptly, without any background music; it cuts straight to the echoing announcements typical of Tokyo subway stations.
The scene cuts in.
The platform at Kichijoji Station was bustling with people.
Shin Kitahara plays Taku Tozaki, who wears an ordinary white shirt and carries a canvas bag over his shoulder, blending into the crowd of people waiting for the bus.
He looked quite refreshing, but his eyes were a little unfocused, revealing the kind of restraint and confusion that comes from someone who has just come from the countryside to study in a big city, as if he hadn't fully adapted to the frighteningly fast pace of Tokyo.
This is the kind of college student you'd see anywhere in Tokyo.
The train arrival announcement sounded.
Du Qituo moved forward a step with the crowd, his gaze aimlessly crossing the railway tracks and landing on the platform opposite.
Suddenly, he stopped moving.
In the crowded scene across the street, that white dress stood out conspicuously.
She has long hair, a stubborn yet beautiful profile, and is looking down at the magazine in her hand.
Du Qituo's pupils dilated slightly.
A valve deep within my memory was flung open in that instant.
"Rikako?"
His lips moved, the name rolled on his tongue, but he didn't have time to say it out loud.
"Boom!"
The yellow train roared into the station, its massive steel body forming a brutal barrier that instantly cut off his view.
The wind blew up the waste paper on the ground.
When the train came to a complete stop and the doors opened, the platform opposite was already mostly empty.
The white figure has disappeared.
Du Qituo stood there, looking at the empty space opposite him, his face expressionless, only his shoulders slumped slightly.
At that moment, many audience members in the theater felt a sudden tightness in their chests.
The moment you catch a glimpse of something, it's blocked, leaving you feeling lost and helpless, like a tiny needle piercing the heart of everyone adrift in a big city.
Then, the scene changes.
The color tone instantly changed from the gray and oppressive atmosphere of Tokyo to a clear and almost dazzling blue.
The subtitle appears: [Kochi Prefecture, two years ago].
Director Tomomichi Mochizuki's skill began to shine at this moment.
There's none of that artificially aged soft lighting in the image; it's incredibly realistic. Looking at the screen, it feels like you're really standing under the blazing sun, instantly transporting everyone back to that sweltering summer.
That was a summer for intellectuals.
The cicadas were chirping loudly, the sunlight was blindingly bright, and the classroom fan was whirring, but it couldn't lift the sweat-soaked shirts clinging to the boys' backs.
Du Qituo sat in the back row of the classroom, twirling his pen and staring blankly out the window.
Then, the transfer student named Rikako Muto walked in.
As the plot unfolds, viewers gradually realize that this is not the kind of dramatic love story they had expected.
There are no terminal illnesses, no car accidents, no family feuds, and no melodramatic plots about fighting the whole world for love.
This story is as ordinary as the half-empty bottle of warm soda that everyone drank that summer.
Rikako is not a perfect goddess.
On the contrary, her personality was so awful it made people grit their teeth.
She was somewhat selfish and arrogant, looking down on the countryside. In order to go back to Tokyo to see her father who had stayed there after their divorce, she didn't hesitate to lie and deceive people, borrowing money from Du Qituo and not paying it back. She even dragged Du Qituo all the way to Tokyo as a foil, without considering his feelings at all.
And what about Takumi Torosaki?
He wasn't exactly a heroic protector of women.
He would complain, think that this woman was really troublesome, and choose to play dumb in front of Rikako because he didn't want to offend his friends.
"This is so pathetic!"
A young man in the front row muttered something, his brow furrowed as he held popcorn in his hand.
Strangely, he didn't leave; instead, he sat up even straighter, his eyes fixed on the screen.
Because it's so real.
This is what most people's youth is like.
How many heroes save damsels in distress during youth?
For most people, youth is made up of these trivial, mundane things. It's the feeling of wanting to touch but then pulling back, the awkwardness of pretending not to care when you do care, and the frustration of watching the girl you like act silly but being powerless to do anything about it.
Especially the scene in the Tokyo hotel.
Rikako ran to see her father with great joy, hoping that he would stand by her side and help her escape Kochi.
When they arrived, they discovered that their father already had a new girlfriend and was living a very comfortable life.
The father treated his daughter, who had suddenly appeared, with great politeness, as if she were an ignorant distant relative. He even arranged for her to stay in a hotel and had no intention of taking her home at all.
At that moment, she realized that she no longer had a place there, and that the safe haven in her heart simply did not exist.
Takuto Morisaki slept in the bathtub.
He heard the crying outside, turned over, covered his ears with a pillow, but in the end he still sighed and didn't push open the door to give her a hug.
Kitahara Shin perfectly captured that inner turmoil of being cautiously afraid of crossing the line, yet also feeling incredibly heartbroken.
He didn't make any exaggerated expressions; he just stared blankly at the ceiling, his Adam's apple bobbing up and down.
This one action brought tears to the eyes of Kenichi Oshima, who was sitting in the corner of the audience.
A scene from twenty years ago suddenly popped into his mind.
At that time, he and Yoko had not yet established a relationship. Yoko was crying at the beach because of her college entrance exams.
He was just like Takumi Tokisaki in the movie, incredibly timid, standing there dumbfounded, at a loss, wanting to go up and hug him but not daring to, even hesitating for a long time to hand him a handkerchief.
I almost missed out on the other person back then because of this timidity. Looking back now, that clumsy and naivety is actually the most precious thing.
The plot continues to unfold.
Viewers initially expected some major plot twist, such as the male lead finally snapping or the female lead finally realizing the truth.
but no.
They returned to Kochi, and life went on. Rikako was ostracized by the girls in her class because of her personality issues.
Then, the classic corridor scene arrived.
The incident started because Rikako refused to participate in rehearsal and was surrounded and attacked by the girls in her class in the corridor. Taku Morisaki listened from the corner, not daring to show his face, and only came out after the girls finished cursing and left.
At that moment, his mischievous teenage boyishness kicked in.
He looked at Rikako, intending to offer a few words of comfort or to show that "I'm on your side."
But when the words were about to come out, he had to act cool and try to appear calm by joking, so he casually said, "You were really something just now. You weren't afraid of so many people and you even managed to talk back. I'm impressed."
He thought his joke would ease the tension and even felt he was quite humorous.
But he forgot that Rikako had only been putting on a brave face. She was like a cat with its fur standing on end; inside, she was incredibly weak and felt terribly wronged.
Du Qituo's flippant remark sounded like a monkey show to her, completely shattering her last line of defense.
She felt like a clown, being made a laughingstock by this boy.
Rikako suddenly looked up, her eyes red-rimmed, and gritted her teeth as she cursed, "I hate you the most! You idiot!"
"Snapped!"
The slap landed squarely on Du Qituo's face, the sound so crisp it could be heard throughout the entire theater.
The entire audience fell silent.
Everyone thought that Takuto Tozaki would get angry, or at least fight back.
But he didn't.
Shin Kitahara's performance here is particularly vivid—he stands there, covering his burning cheeks, looking completely bewildered, watching Rikako run away crying, his mouth slightly open, his eyes full of confusion.
He had absolutely no idea what he had said wrong.
That kind of awkwardness unique to boys, that clumsiness of "wanting to make a good impression but messing it up," made the male audience members want to cover their faces—it was so real. Who hasn't done something stupid like that when they were young?
They think they're being humorous, but they're actually rubbing salt into someone's wounds.
The movie ends with a reunion of classmates after graduation.
As they drank and reminisced about embarrassing moments from the past, Du Qituo gazed at the brightly lit Kochi Castle in the distance and finally understood his own feelings.
But he realized it too late.
Rikako has already gone to Tokyo.
The scene then cuts back to Kichijoji Station, the location from the beginning.
It's the same platform.
This time, Du Qituo didn't hesitate. He rushed to the opposite platform, pushing through the crowded people, searching for that white figure.
The camera shakes, conveying a sense of rapid breathing.
at last.
He saw it.
The girl was standing there, looking at the train timetable.
She seemed to sense something and turned her head.
In that instant, the wind blew her long hair, revealing that familiar smile, yet one that had matured considerably.
The image freezes.
The gentle piano prelude of the ending theme song, "Umi ni Naretara" (If I Could Become the Sea), slowly begins.
【end】
The lights came on.
But the theater was very quiet.
No one rushed to get up, no one made a loud noise, and even the cleaning lady stood at the door, not daring to come in.
Everyone just sat there in their seats, as if they hadn't yet woken up from the sea breeze of Kochi.
"That's it??"
After a long while, someone in the back row asked in a low voice, their tone carrying a hint of lingering confusion.
"Okay, that's it."
The companion next to him stretched, rubbed his slightly red eyes, and said in a hoarse voice, "He didn't say anything, but it's like he said everything."
"Sigh, I wish I had been half as gentle as Takumi Morisaki when I was in high school."
"Come on, you were even more of a coward back then, you didn't even dare to send him a love letter."
"That Rikako—she's just like the girl who sat in front of me, with such a terrible personality, but I was totally smitten back then. Do you think I'm crazy?"
The crowd began to loosen up slowly, and hushed discussions rose and fell.
The conversation wasn't about how amazing Kitahara Shin's acting was, or how beautiful Miyazawa Rie was; instead, everyone was talking about themselves.
Let's talk about the cicadas chirping that summer, the eraser we borrowed and never returned, and the person we brushed past in the hallway but didn't dare to look up at.
The Oshima couple walked out of the cinema with the crowd.
It was already dark outside, but the streets of Shinjuku were still flashing neon lights, and the air was filled with that familiar, anxiety-inducing heat.
But Yoko Oshima, holding her husband's hand, walked with much lighter steps.
"that----"
She suddenly spoke up, smiling a little shyly, "Actually, I wrote you a letter during my senior year of high school, but I didn't dare to give it to you."
Kenichi Oshima paused for a moment, then smiled, the wrinkles at the corners of his eyes smoothing out.
"I know."
"You know that?"
"I saw you put it in my backpack that day, but I was afraid the teacher would find out, so I secretly took it home to look at it. I never dared to tell you."
"You! Kenichi Oshima, you liar!"
Yangzi punched her husband's arm. The two men, who were nearly eighty years old combined, were laughing like two fools on the street.
The impact of this movie is greater than anyone imagined.
It doesn't have the intoxicating effect of strong liquor; it's more like a glass of light lemonade. It's a bit sour and astringent when you first drink it, but after a while, you'll find a hint of sweetness in your mouth.
In this harsh winter of bursting bubbles, widespread fear, and everyone desperately trying to stretch every penny, this film offers the cheapest yet most luxurious comfort.
It tells everyone:
Even if life is a mess now, even if we've all become tired adults, at least we all had that summer.
The spread of the virus is faster than a virus.
Although there was no big-budget promotion, the next morning, various radio stations were filled with requests for "Umi ni Nareta".
The number of views for the show began to soar.
On BBS forums, discussion threads about "Hearing the Waves" have been building up to a great height.
"For just 1,000 yuan, you can buy back the summer of your seventeenth year. That's unbeatable value for money."
"I went to see it because of Kitahara Shin, but I ended up crying. His acting was too relaxed; he didn't have that 'acting' feel at all, like the guy who lives next door to me."
"Rie Miyazawa is so beautiful. This is the first time I've seen her act. Although her character is really a complete drama queen, she makes her so lovable that you can't hate her. Instead, you find her kind of cute."
"Don't bring your current partner to see this! Don't ask me why, I'm kneeling on a washboard right now."
This kind of "word-of-mouth" promotion is the most dangerous.
The next afternoon.
The once somewhat empty cinema lobby began to become crowded.
Long queues formed in front of the ticket windows.
Watching the ticket sales figures jump around, the agent called Kitahara Shin, his voice filled with unbelievable excitement: "Kitahara-kun, the attendance is phenomenal! Even higher than on weekends!"
"Several cinemas in Shinjuku have decided to increase their screenings, allocating some of their slots originally intended for Hollywood blockbusters to us."
.
in the apartment.
Kitahara Shin hung up the phone, looked out the window at the brightly lit night view, and poured himself a glass of water.
He was not surprised by the film's success.
In this era where everyone is falling apart, what people need is neither profound preaching nor false inspirational platitudes.
Instead, it was a breeze carrying the scent of sea salt that allowed one to catch their breath.
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