Movie with Abe: It’s Me, It’s Me

It’s Me, It’s Me
Directed by Satoshi Miki
Released November 8, 2013

Reality is a tricky thing, and sometimes it’s possible for it to be manipulated in unexpected ways. It’s often difficult to discern what is real and what is simply in the mind of a film’s protagonist, but that doesn’t necessarily make the events any less compelling. “It’s Me, It’s Me,” the intriguing Japanese film which debuted in the United States this weekend, follows Hitoshi (Kayuza Kamenashi), a lowly employee in an electronics store who dreams of being a professional photographer, who suddenly finds himself in over his head as he literally runs into other versions of himself at every turn.

The way in which “It’s Me, It’s Me” unfurls its storyline is not without its peculiarities, and Hitoshi demonstrates himself to be an individualized soul early on in the film. His relationship with his mother is hardly healthy, and she insists that he not call her mother because of her age. His work situation is far from ideal, and he falls head over heels for a married customer who immediately catches his eye, just as his domineering and irritating boss sets his sights on her too. Hitoshi’s problems soon spiral out of control as he must deal with his new external manifestations of his personality, and struggle to stay alive and in a sensible frame of mind.

“It’s Me, It’s Me” feels like a very stylized film, vastly unrecognizable from a typical American independent movie. The science-fiction nature of Hitoshi’s cloning is not addressed, and it actually results from a cell phone scam that Hitoshi perpetrates, and the karma he receives is in the form of the identity he tried to steal assuming his identity instead. While the prospects of Hitoshi’s multiplication are appealing, it’s hard to get attached to the film when it doesn’t value logic or try to offer any kind of explanation for its utterly bizarre events.

C+