In the traditional, highly refined Japanese artform of banraku puppetry, the three men required to manipulate each puppet are in clear view to the audience. Because the art and the labour are exhibited simultaneously, the artiface of it because an integral part of the performance rather than something to disguise. In a similar way, Dolls makes no attempt to appear natural and is self-conciously highly constructed and stylised.
An ode to the unique form of pupperty, the film opens with a beautiful sequence of a banraku performance and then proceeds to tell three different stories of undying love, the most visually enticing of which is the tale of the young lovers bound by a red chord who roam the changing country side throughout Japan’s four distinct seasons.
It is in these chapters where the film’s designer Yohji Yamamoto really goes all out with his conceptual costumes, creating a surreal and vibrantly colourful world that is untainted by verbal dialogue or other earthly ties. By the end of their long journey the troubled lovers take on the gorgeous traditional kimonos originally worn by the bunraku puppets in the opening sequence, further emphasising their existence as mere ‘dolls’ enacting a well-known love story at the hands of a puppeteer who is manipulating their every move.
While a costume designer usually works within set boundaries of the film to find the most suitable dress for pre-conceived characters, in this case it was evidently the other way around. “We had to adjust locations and stories to match his costumes,” says director Takeshi Kitano, and the aesthetic created by Yamamoto’s creations is really what gives this strange film its distinct mood.
