The Courage to Verify What Catches Your Antenna Without Letting It Slip Away

When I go to the movie theater, I use public transportation unless it's a late show. Although I have a driver's license, I'm not good at driving, so I try to avoid it as much as possible. Therefore, I prefer to watch movies on weekday afternoons when public transportation is running.

This is a regional city where cars are essential, but if you can tolerate some inconvenience, you can live without one. A movie theater that takes 10 minutes by car takes about 30 minutes by bus. However, the bus only runs once an hour. So, I usually end up waiting for several tens of minutes both going and coming back.
If a movie is two hours long, it becomes a half-day job, taking roughly four hours from the time I leave home until I return.

Using a weekday afternoon for a hobby requires courage for me right now. Even though I used to think, 'Since I'm a freelancer, I can go watch movies whenever I want! Let's go!', it's actually quite difficult.

I have (started to) become able to take time off for trips or concerts of artists I support, but movies have a high hurdle.
A trip is a major event that I plan well in advance, thinking, 'I'm going on this day! I'm definitely going!', and realize by paying the necessary travel and accommodation expenses.
Concerts are similar to trips. The dates are fixed, and since they are usually held in big cities like Tokyo, Osaka, or Nagoya, they involve staying overnight.

Movies don't require that much resolve, cost, or careful preparation, but since they take half a day, they need to be properly incorporated into my schedule.
Excuses for not going, like 'Is this a film I really want to see enough to take half a day off work? Wouldn't it be fine to wait until it's available on streaming?', gradually erode my mind, and in the end, there are many films I've given up on.

One of the films I didn't go to the theater to see because I was defeated by excuses is JOHN WICK. I watched it on the first day of streaming, but I regretted not seeing it in the theater.

Before being drawn to a movie theater, the film must have caught my eye because something about it resonated with me. Whether I want to experience excitement, be moved, get a hint to break through my current situation, or simply support an artist I like.

If I keep ignoring the things that catch my antenna like that, I feel like my sensitivity and motivation will dull.
Just as cup noodles that have sat for 10 or 20 minutes get soggy and don't taste good, I think the best time to watch a movie is when you want to watch it. Even if there are hits and misses.

In that way, 'Isn't it fine to stream it later?' and 'Do it now!' are always at odds when it comes to wanting to watch a movie.

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A film I recently went to see, pushing aside the excuses that welled up, is 'Sunset Sunrise'.
Nishio (played by Masaki Suda), a company employee at a major Tokyo firm, moves to Sanriku during the COVID-19 pandemic. The reason he chose Sanriku is because he likes fishing. With remote work, he no longer needed to commute, so he decided to move.

Although it packs in heavy themes like COVID, the earthquake disaster, and the issue of vacant houses, it's typical of Kankuro Kudo to be able to depict them sometimes comically without making them too heavy.

I am not from Tohoku, and I wasn't in Tohoku during the earthquake, but I believe I must properly know about the disaster.
While you can look up anything with a single thumb, seeing, hearing, eating, touching, and verifying are things you can only do by using your feet and going outside.

I think Nishio had a similar aspect.
Even if you can look up what kind of fish you can catch in the Sanriku sea on the internet, you can't find out about dishes that can only be eaten in Tohoku/Sanriku, the unique human relationships in a rural town, the differences in perception regarding COVID, or the fact that cashless payments are not used at all, even if you search for them.
How many things can you only understand by actually going there?

Nowadays, there are so many things I feel I know because I read about them in online news or see them on social media. But I think it's scary and foolish to think you understand something by looking at the tip of the iceberg. And not just about the earthquake. Everything.

Including the judgment and action of watching this movie in a theater, this film made me realize how much value an 'experience' has for me.

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I think it's nearing the end of its run in any theater, but this is a film I really want you to watch in a theater, right up to the end credits.
You can clearly see that your common sense and what you take for granted are not common sense at all. Thanks to those end credits, you'll want to soak in the lingering feeling.

Besides, all the food that appears looks absolutely delicious.
I also started wanting to eat fish, so I ended up buying some on my way home.

Ah, I'm hungry.

Thank you for reading again today.
What is something you have checked for yourself recently?