Takashi Shimura credited as playing...
Kanji Watanabe
- Kanji: [singing] Life is brief / Fall in love, maiden / Before the crimson bloom / Fades from your lips / Before the tides of passion / Cool within you / For those of you / Who know no tomorrow...
- Kanji: How beautiful! Truly beautiful. A sunset. I don't think I've really looked at one in 30 years.
- Kanji: ...I did it all for my son's sake. But as it turned out, my son doesn't seem to give a whit.
- Toyo: But you can't blame it all on your son... Not unless he asked you to make a mummy of yourself. My mom gives me the same kind of line sometimes. "The things I've suffered for you." And I'm grateful she had me. But it's not my fault I was born...
- Toyo: What help am I?
- Kanji: You - just to look at you makes me feel better. It warms this - this mummy's heart of mine. And you're so kind to me. No; that's not it. You're so young, so healthy. No; that's not it either... You're so full of life. And me... I'm jealous of that. If I could be like you for just one day before I died. I won't be able to die unless I can do that. I want to do *something*. Only you can show me. I don't know what to do. I don't know how. Maybe you don't know either, but, please... if you can... show me how to be like you!
- Kanji: Drinking this expensive sake is like paying myself back with poison for the way I lived all these years.
- Kanji: All these 30 years - what have I been doing there? I can't remember no matter how I try. All I remember - is just being busy - and even then I was bored.
- Kanji: Now I remember: I nearly drowned in a pond once when I was a child. I felt exactly the same way then. Everything's going black. I writhe and thrash around, but there's nothing to hold on to - except you.
- Toyo: What about your son?
- Kanji: Don't talk to me about him! I have no son. I'm all alone.
- Toyo: But...
- Kanji: No, you don't understand! My son is somewhere far away. Just as my mom and pop were when I was drowning in that pond. Remembering it now, it's even more painful than it was then.
- Toyo: All I do is make these little things.
- [Pulls out a stuffed mechanical bunny]
- Toyo: Just making these is so much fun. I feel like I'm making friends with every baby in Japan. Why don't you try making something too?
- Kanji: What could I possibly make at that office.
- Toyo: Yeah, it's hopeless there. You should quit and go somewhere...
- Kanji: It's too late - - No - It's not too late. It's not hopeless. Even there, there's something I can do. I just have to find the will.
- Kanji: It's just that I've been such a fool. I'm just so mad at myself. Until a few days ago I had never even bought myself a drink. It's only now that I don't know how much longer I have to live that I've finally begun.
- Novelist: I understand. I understand. But drinking now is plain crazy. Besides, does it even taste good?
- Kanji: No, it doesn't. But for a little while I can forget my cancer and all the other painful things.