Norwegian Wood --- Pilar Diaz

 When it came to watching Norwegian Wood my feelings were a pretty mixed bag. Starting with what I did like about the film, I thought the casting was pretty great, they looked more or less like I imagined them when I read the book. This is specifically in reference to Naoko’s and Midori’s casting, the two actresses that were picked to fit the descriptions Murakami had in his novel. My favorite in the film was probably when Watanabe was talking to Midori in the snow. What had made mise en scène particularly striking for me was that there was this almost blurry blue filter back drop. While the two characters speak the rest of their world is quieted, I think this staging works particularly well with the magical realism elements that are so fundamentally Murakami-esque that was otherwise lacking for most of the film. The music in this scene worked so well, the melody fit Midori’s confession and plea for Watanabe that he could do whatever he wants with her but to just not hurt her. Though that being said there was a lot about the film that I didn’t particularly care for. One of my biggest gripes with the film is how Midori’s character was kind of gutted. I know she wasn’t a class favorite, but her characterisation no matter how tropey or bad it came off, was important for Watanabe's progression and why he ended up falling in love with her despite how he felt compromised with Naoko. Another issue I had was I didn’t feel like the film was long enough. Given that the novel had so much material to work with and all the minor details added to the narrative the film would have benefited if it was three hours long instead of two hours. Short stories like Barn Burning getting movie adaptations work well with Murakami as then all details can be included in the film, but the same just simply can’t apply to such a dense read like Norwegian Wood. At minimum it felt like the film should have been three hours, but the novel would have benefited far more from a TV show adaptation. The last issue I had was what part of what made Norwegian Wood such a good novel was Watanabe’s narration, and not having it in the film was a huge bummer.