I Wish: Child-like Perspective on Miracles and Traditions

Before we began “I Wish” (dir. Koreeda, 2011), our professor asked us how the child’s perspective is privileged in the film. Through cinematography, story elements, and assumptions made about children’s beliefs, the film is able to “understand children,” as one critic said.

            “I Wish” is the story of two brothers. One of them, Koichi, who lives with their mother, hears a myth from a friend that when two bullet trains pass each other, a miracle happens, and upon seeing can make miracle happen in the viewers life. He plans a trip with the same friends to watch and make their wishes. He tells his younger brother, Ryu, who lives far away with their father, and he proposes to his friends that they also go. When they finally meet to witness the miracle together, it’s been six months.

            As we see their lives parallel, participating in similar activities such as school and spending time with friends, we also see the contrast in their perspectives. Koichi wishes for their parents to get back together so they can live together again. Koichi dreams of how they used to be with his family enjoying a picnic together. It affords child perspective because Koichi himself narrates it. Not only does the audience see what Koichi sees in his dream, but we also hear how he interprets it. Ryu on the other hand dreams of how their parents were constantly fighting. He also narrates. Viewers experience first-hand accounts, and moreover does not limit children to idealists as Ryu’s dream contrasts with Koichi’s.

            Another way in which the film “understands children” is through the camera’s position. It is always leveled with the children. One particularly memorable shot is when Ryu prepares to ask his father for money. The camera is stationary as Ryu sits. The father is forced to come into the frame by sitting cross-legged on the floor in front of his son.

The film creates a believable backdrop to the story with its presumption about kids and the merit they give myths. Just like it is children that are able to believe in Santa Claus, it is also children that pursue this bullet-train-miracle-legend. A child’s perspective is one that hopes in fictional possibilities because they are not jaded by reality.

Children’s media is important in perpetuating legends, and legends are often a significant factor in family traditions. In “I Wish,” Ryu and Koichi start a tradition by traveling hundreds of miles by train to see each other. It is hinted that they will do it again. But it started because of a Japanese tradition of seeing two bullet trains pass each other produces a miracle. The film is rooted in tradition and legend perpetuating the old and creating new. “My Grandmother Ironed the King’s  Shirts” (dir. Kove, 1999) also represents this effect of tradition and tales on family and childhood. The grandmother of the filmmaker created the legend by doing what is depicted in the story. The filmmaker perpetuates tradition in creating the film that will continue telling the story for her, but also preserves a family tradition of storytelling just in a different medium (film vs. spoken). Both films create and perpetuate tradition of familial and cultural significance.

            “I Wish” provides children’s perspectives to be explored. Director Hirokazu Koreeda helps us to understand children by helping us see how they see, dream how they dream, and believe how they believe.

While I was watching "I Wish," I was reminded of another film ("Little Manhattan", dir. Levin and Flackett, 2005) that shows the perspective of a child coping with the divorce of his parents. (It's Peeta before he was Peeta!)

And this film ("A Little Romance", dir. George Roy Hill, 1979) is another example about belief in legends providing for a childhood adventure. (Diane Lane when she was a teenager!)