Originally published April 12, 2015 on FrontRowCentral.com
Joel & Ethan Coen’s Fargo famously opens with a title card announcing that what we’re about to see is a true story. David & Nathan Zellner’s Kumiko The Treasure Hunter opens with that very same title card, warped and filled with the static of a videotape watched and rewatched a hundred times. But while Fargo turned out purely to be a product of the Coens’ imagination, Kumiko is indeed based on an urban legend, itself a uniquely sordid tale in its own right. The Zellners spin that tale into a work of startling beauty, at times mimicking the Coens’ trademark style, but often finding wonders of their own.
The film opens in Tokyo, where we meet 29-year-old office girl Kumiko (Rinko Kikuchi). There is no joy in this young woman’s life; both her mother and boss insist that it’s time she settle down and start a family (the latter even introducing her to her eventual replacement). She has no ambition in her line of work, but also no real reason to leave, seemingly trapped by that lifestyle. Kumiko’s sole object of affection is a worn out VHS copy of the movie Fargo that she discovered on a beach. After countless viewings, Kumiko comes to the conclusion that the story is real, that Steve Buscemi’s buried briefcase full of money is still out there, waiting to be discovered. Equipped only with a stolen company credit card, a book full of notes and a handknit treasure map, Kumiko boards a plane for Minnesota in search of her prize.
Kumiko establishes early that its main character is not exactly the soundest of minds. Her obsessive tendencies and sullen disposition are obvious clues that we have a tragic figure on our hands. She barely speaks to friends or family; she gazes out her window at night, watching the neighbors dance; she feeds noodles to her rabbit, Bunzo, seemingly for want of something to do. Above all else, Kumiko seems bored with her life. This opening act, in which Kumiko builds her case for trekking deep into “the Americas” and labels herself a conquistador, does a marvelous job of painting her as a person wholly divorced from society, and possibly even reality.
Only when Kumiko arrives in Minnesota does the film shift gears and begin to lean on the sights and sounds of Fargo. The music, provided by The Octopus Project, directly riffs off of Carter Burwell’s score, at times sounding nearly identical. It’s lovely, haunting music, and it helps create the illusion that Kumiko has actually stepped outside of reality and into the Coens’ fantasy world. Filmed largely in the same locales, and occasionally featuring familiar landmarks like the Paul Bunyan statue, Kumiko inhabits the Fargo universe with ease. Zellner manages to paint an equally bleak, spare portrait of rural Minnesota without stooping to the point of caricature.
That distinction is an important one to make. Kumiko isn’t simply a film out to ride the coattails of a modern classic. While Coen fans may appreciate the nods and winks this film sends their way, newcomers won’t be left in the dark. The Zellners, instead, are asking us to consider how we relate to the media we consume. How much we invest ourselves in the stories we enjoy can sometimes become destructive, even if we can’t see it. Already committed to her quest, Kumiko takes the Coens word for it that their story is true. When she arrives in Minnesota nothing dissuades her from that belief, because seemingly nothing has changed in the twenty years since they shot that film. Though maybe that’s more a comment on the state of rural America.
Where Kumiko diverges from Fargo, though, is in this film’s almost misplaced sense of irony. Fargo’s bold streak of black humor works, in part, because it pitches it so forcefully against the “Minnesota nice” stereotype. Kumiko tries to apply that same tactic and often comes up short, largely because in place of a Marge Gunderson going after hardened sleazebags, we have a genuine culture clash between a Japanese tourist and locals who simply don’t know any better. At one point, Kumiko is picked up on the highway by a local retiree (Shirley Venard), whose only exposure to anything remotely Japanese is the James Clavell novel “Shogun.” Later, a sheriff’s deputy (David Zellner) tries to help her by asking the owner of a Chinese restaurant to translate for her. These moments are played for laughs, but instead further feed into Kumiko’s feeling of isolation. It also feels like a weak attempt to mimic the Coens’ sense of humor, the one instance where the Zellners can’t quite pull off that magic trick.
The truth is that Kumiko The Treasure Hunter plays much stronger as tragedy than comedy. Kumiko’s journey is less a quixotic treasure hunt and more about a young woman desperately searching for a purpose in life. Work and home have nothing to offer her, but the allure of buried treasure is too much to resist, even if everyone tries to convince her that Fargo isn’t real. Fargo IS real for Kumiko, because without Fargo, Kumiko has nothing. Besides, the movie told her it was real, so obviously it must be true. The beauty of cinema is that it blurs the line between fiction and reality, sometimes in exciting and wondrous ways. Where some see fantasy, others might see truth. And sometimes, that’s all that matters.
Archive.org’s Wayback Machine had no record of this review, so it’s been recreated from my original draft.
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