I Just Didn't Do It

I applaud the film director, Masayuki Suo, for having the courage to put out such a poignant film that speaks volumes about Japan's flawed justice system as a Japanese citizen. The 99.9% guilty rate is a reality not taken seriously by foreigners and many of those living in Japan. As a foreigner, it was interesting to see how laws are applied within the context of such a seemingly modernized and developed country. We follow the main character, Teppei, who is caught at the wrong place at the wrong time as he is accused of committing a crime he did not commit. With the assumption that standing by his innocence will set him free quickly and painlessly, we soon learn about the psychological battle he and those close to him have to battle.

Japan's judicial system is very different from westernized systems. In Canada for instance, much of our outcries and screams of injustice belies on the fact that the justice system "protects" criminals. More guilty people walk away or serve light sentences for crimes committed here. In Japan, it is quite the opposite and it makes one ponder... how many innocent people exactly are locked up? How easy is it for individuals to take advantage on that "trust" and falsely accuse another person of a crime they did not commit for the purpose of a hefty out-of-court settlement? In all, this film was excellent and is an important tool for us to reflect upon how "justice" is applied in different nations. It is exceptionally accurate in its portrayals of the daily ins and outs of those in Japanese jails. To assume that the Japanese system "can't really be THAT bad" is a slap in the face to all those who had to undergo that kind of psychological hardship as INNOCENT men and women. I am saying this as a fact. My boyfriend had spent close to a month in jail with accusations for a crime he did NOT commit. The prosecutor's only goal is to dig up any kind of confession by any means necessary - verbal coercion, bending stories, refusing or providing menial legal counsel, etc. When your ultimate verdict is guilty from the start, what kind of justice does an innocent individual have left? Is it right for an innocent man to say that he is guilty when he is absolutely innocent? Think about that.

"Pruning away most of the peripheral tributaries from the artery, Suo adamantly arranges a blow-by-blow exhibition of the court-room procedurals, to anatomizes every and each go-around between the belligerent prosecution/defendant parties, down to every single evidence or a witness's gesture, yet, Suo's camera eye does not stay sedentary, sometimes it stares disinterestedly the manifolds reactions with blatant close-ups, or twirls around the limited space in one long shot to show Kaneko's disoriented state when his verdict is being issued, or simply . Like the top-line court-room drama, Sydney Lumet's 12 ANGRY MEN (1957), I JUST DIDN'T DO IT is a crying plea for justice and a seismic opprobrium of societal prejudice and systematical incompetence."

read my full review on my blog: cinema omnivore, thanks

Two ironies attest to critiquing this film a year after it was submitted to the 2008 Oscars for Best Foreign Language Film. First of all, this year, 2009, saw the Japanese feature Okuribito scoop that very award, a film directed by a man whose early credits include a long-running 'train molester' series, a sniggering look at the titillation gained from the sport of groping vulnerable-but-loving-it females on crowded commuter trains.

The second irony is that the Japanese Supreme Court recently overturned a guilty verdict on a man convicted of such a crime, citing the lack of evidence and due procedure on the part of police and prosecutors.

Okuribito's debt to Suo's film is tenuous, but the Supreme Court decision seems unlikely had Sore Demo not been made. The film highlights the primitive and highly dubious procedures that infest the Japanese judicial system, where habeas corpus is trampled upon and a benign and apathetic populace conspire by neglect in the crushing of innocents. The scale of the molester problem is apparent to any visitor to these shores who spends time on commuter trains - Women Only carriages are now the norm at rush-hour, a far cry from the halcyon days previously celebrated by the director of Okuribito, when 'how to molest' programmes were broadcast on mainstream TV channels. Times have changed, and how.

Suo elects to tell the tale as an Educational film, attempting to edify his audience on the corruption of the Japanese judiciary from the base assumption that they know nothing. Such stylistics have come unstuck before in Nihon no Ichiban Kuroi Natsu, where the didactic tone fails to encapsulate the social ramifications of the material it addresses. But Suo's film does not go off on that tangent, presenting as its innocent in need of education a single man falsely accused in a groping incident. He is a decent, loved man who finds circumstances piling up against him in a country he previously, naively, accepted as fundamentally good. Ryo Kase does excellent work as meek Teppei, who puts up with his treatment initially unaware of the hole that is being dug for him. His resolve not to opt for the easy 'guilty' verdict that will secure quick release is a deep moral core by contrast lacking in the police, judges, fourth estate and even his own solicitor.

The preaching can be a bit heavy-handed at times, and the film is at least 30 minutes too long. Some dubious side characters are overdrawn, such as an effeminate cell-mate thrown on stage to provide giggles and more leadership for Teppei. Such small qualms aside, this movie is an epochal event, an important film, that highlights an incredible, mean-spirited flaw in Japanese society, that the recent Supreme Court decision may finally relegate to history.

Suo's direction is spare and unobtrusive, his actors given space to reveal the consequences of such judicial brutality, which they do with aplomb. Brave, important film-making, that history will take note of.

The film follows the procedures of an unfortunate man as he is arrested, indicted, and tried for groping, a criminal offense. Throughout, the audience is confronted with moral dilemmas, questions on the most basic, most fundamental principles of the justice system and court procedure. Of course, the basic tenet is "innocent until proved guilty," but how does a court truly guarantee such? How does a justice system work efficiently without error? How should the justice system correct itself when there is a mistake? And how should the defendant act when he is wrongly accused? These questions are relevant to any nation, not just Japan.

Despite all the considerations of a highly developed democratic system, the main character, Teppei, still finds himself in the most unfortunate situation of being indicted for a crime he did not commit. Japan has checks and balances different from the United States or other western nations. Most innocent people are freed in the Kensatsu (something similar to the prosecutor) and are never indicted. In a sense, there is a court involving investigation, before the actual court. That a defendant, before entering a court room, has already been found guilty in two separate investigations renders the court a place to merely decide what the punishment should be. This is the reality of 99.9% guilty rate (which includes those who plead guilty). Teppei finds himself in the unlucky situation where he actually gets indicted despite being innocent.

After seeing this movie, many people, especially non-Japanese, will get the wrong impression of the Japanese justice system, which is a lot more fair than this film gives credit to. Regardless, the film presents a very valuable and justified perspective of the way criminal cases are handled in Japan and forces us to contemplate the concept of courts regardless of nation.

Japan's foreign-film entry to the 2008 Academy Awards is a doozy and arrives from one of the country's preeminent filmmakers, Masayuki Suo. In his first film since 1996's "Shall We Dansu?", he brings the same discriminating eye back to Japan's cultural and social norms and in "I Just Didn't Do It", zeros in on its oppressively rigid judicial system. Observed on a level that can only be described as stark realism, a true departure from Suo's august social comedies and a distinct legal procedural going by its narrative trajectory of showing the inciting incident, investigation and to the courtroom in its various stages of due process – Teppei Kaneko (Ryo Kase) is accused of molesting a schoolgirl on his way to a job interview, subsequently coerced by weary detectives to accept the charge and pay the fine instead of pursuing vindication – a system that Suo notes as the reason for Japan's almost perfect conviction rate and institutionalised prejudice against the accused.