Review of “Ryuichi Sakamoto: Opus”: The composer’s exciting farewell

“Ryuichi Sakamoto: Opus”

Janus films

To call Ryuichi Sakamoto: Opus A concert film would be correct and also grossly inadequate. What unfolds on screen is neither a mere performance, nor a mere gesture, but a face to face between presence and absence. Opening its theatrical release just before the one-year anniversary of Sakamoto’s death from cancer, at the age of 71, the handsome film is a testament to the artistic spirit and, above all, a labor of love – by the performer, who was facing mortality and reflection. From the heirloom, and by director Niu Sora, who is the son of Ryuichi Sakamoto.

Shows captured on Authorship It was filmed over the course of a week in September 2022, in a studio at Tokyo’s NHK Broadcasting Center which Sakamoto believes offers the best acoustics in Japan. He and Sora embarked on this project while Sakamoto was still in good enough shape to perform. Other than the invisible filmmakers, there is no audience. Alone in his grand Yamaha, with a bright lamp burning above him like the moon, the composer makes his way through 20 pieces of music he has curated from his life in the music industry.

Selections include his famous film scores – Protecting sky, Happy birthday Mr. Lawrence and his Oscar-winning work with David Byrne and Kong Soo The last emperor – as well as his solo recordings and the poignant electro-pop of Yellow Magic Orchestra, a trio he formed in 1978 with Yukihiro Takahashi and Harumi Hosono. (Drummer Takahashi died in January 2023, two months before Sakamoto’s death.)

Sakamoto reconfigures some of the compositions, a few of which he has never played publicly before, for solo piano, and travels across diverse musical terrain: quiet passages, melodic lyricism, and bursts of thunderous vibrato. For one number, he created a so-called prepared piano by placing screws and nails on the strings to produce a sound that did not resemble a piano. The fine recording, mixing and mastering, which is credited to ZAK, doesn’t miss a beat, not even a brief case of mumbling as Sakamoto regroups between selections. Otherwise, it’s the piano that does the talking.

In the delicate musical interplay between tradition and modernity, the selections are distinct and connected, quoting and commenting on each other with accelerating force as the film progresses. Sakamoto does not just revisit his compositions, he rediscovers them. Research, communication and occasional joy play on his face; He’s still creating, still deeply invested in the work.

Seurat builds this silent drama using silvery black-and-white images and shifts in light that suggest a movement toward night. Bill Kirstein’s meticulous photography finds a strong variety of angles and viewpoints within the limited frame, and editor Takuya Kawakami intercuts Sakamoto’s performance with shots of the empty keyboard, unused microphone stands in the studio, and the musician’s shadow on the unpolished wooden floor—images that heighten the intensity of the image. The sense of departure that permeates the film no less than the inspiring music.

Authorship It begins with a view of the composer from behind, sitting at the piano, looking small and vulnerable in his boyish artistic shock with his snow-white hair. As this unhurried emotional journey continues, Sakamoto’s passion and precision are inseparable from the gift he offers, and the film feels more and more like a balm in a world full of gadgets and the grandeur of the music world. Sora has created a simple and wonderful work. Her vision of eternity is perhaps most poignant in the moments when Sakamoto’s elegant hands hover over the keyboard at the end of the piece. It’s as if he’s coaxing the final strings to resonate a little longer before fading into something like silence but now, recalled, richer.