BLACK BOX DIARIES (Shiori Ito 2024)

[Chris Knipp]

SHIORI ITO IN BLACK BOX DIARIES

SHIORI ITO: BLACK BOX DIARIES (2024)

An impressive film by the face of #MeToo in Japan

Some nine years ago Shiori Itō, then 26, became the face of the #MeToo movement of Japan by accusing a man in a prominent media position, Noriyuki Yamaguchi, a former Washington bureau chief for the TBS network with close ties to prime minister Shinzo Abe, of raping her. She brought criminal charges and, what was unusual, she showed her face after doing so, appearing in a press conference. She was a fledgling journalist, already accomplished and ambitious. This was to become her story, her occupation, for years to come. (Her field as a journalist and filmmaker is listed as "gender issues".)

Japan is an exceptionally male-dominated society. Everyone knows this, and was aware it had to change. Many, men especially of course, reviled Shiori, while many others thanked her vocally or silently in their hearts. She became famous. As she put it, she became "the girl who got raped." Wikipedia indicates how far her importance spread; she became one of Time's 100 Most Influential People of 2020. Before that in 2017 she published her diaristic account of the whole experience under the title Black Box Diaries. This year, 2024, the film of the same name has appeared.

The beauty and importance of this film are considerable. It is obviously important as the headline case of male sexual aggression in Japan, a test case that goes before others. Then there is Shiori Itō herself. She bears her experience. As she appears, over years Yamaguchi's rape continues to haunt her even though it began when she was unconscious. She speaks modestly and quietly but is brave and articulate. She narrates this film on camera and posts handwritten-style inter-titles in English, making it more international. She is a modern woman, casually elegant, beautiful without contrivance.

The film takes the form largely of a diary, tracing the arduous course of Shiora's struggle to bring Yamaguchi to justice and simultaneously to be an example to the oppressed women in Japan and everywhere and and a warning to men that their free ride is over. The criminal case is dismissed, but a civil one continues, which she wins, and all that is reported here. But this is also a journal recording the day to day psychological ups and downs of living as a survivor of sexual assault, a reminder that that never goes away.

At the outset Shiora warns there will be moments that may be "triggering" and that viewers may need to look away, or close her eyes and take a breath, as she sometimes does. This is an indicator of how as the filmmaker she is quietly in control throughout, but as Guy Lodge says in his Variety review, "Ito’s vulnerabilities can be discomfiting to witness, even with her consent," and she knows that.

This film carries its complexities naturally because they are Shiora's life, what she does, and because everything is smoothly interwoven by the editor, Ema Ryan Yamazaki to, as Lodge puts it, show the transitions she goes through from "eminently professional journo coolly researching her own experience" to "frightened victim overwhelmed by the responsibility of telling her tale." And we feel this complexity and live it with her, which is why this film is so interesting to watch.

We learn what she has to contend with, including an archaic male-dominated Japanese law by which an assault doesn't count as one just because of non-consent, if the resistance wasn't violent - in other words punishing a woman for being a woman. Thus the police brusquely rejected Shiora's initial report of rape. All this is part of the film. So is Shiora's filmed promise that she will never commit suicide and to be suspicious if she dies, later followed by her overdosing, showing how volatile her emotions are. We know why she puts Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive" on her phone.

In the context of numerous lively developments, it packs quite a wallop when the doorman who was on duty at the Sheraton Hotel when Yamaguchi brought Shiora there, drunk but uncooperative, gets in touch with Shiora and says he is committed to testifying for her, and to use his name, no matter what. She weeps in gratitude and we weep with her. And there is footage of the Sheraton arrival, which we watch as this exchange takes place.

When the civil trial decision is announced, there's a big crowd outside, and Shiora appears and announces that though she won, it's not the end, and it's not. Yamaguchi is going to sue, and Shiora is there when he makes a press statement in English and Japanese that while he has many regrets, he is sure he did nothing legally wrong.

It's hard to end the film. But that's almost the point. This is a struggle for survival and for social and legal change that is ongoing to which this film is a splendid introduction. One of the year's best documentaries and a leading contender in that category listed by Gold Derby.

Black Box Diaries, 102 mins., debuted at Sundance Jan. 2024 and over thirty other festivals throughout 2024. Opening in New York (Film Forum) on Fri., Oct. 25 followed by LA, SF and Chicago on Nov. 1. Opens Nov. 1 at the Roxie Theater, San Francisco; Q&A with director Shiori Ito on Nov. 2 at 3:40pm. Nov. 3 at Rafael Film Center, Special one-time screening at 1pm followed by Q&A with Shiori Ito.
Metacritic rating: 87%.