Departures

Departures is a superb film about death, most films nowadays talk about death to be a very depressing matter, where a lot of rage, sorrow and revenge. However, departure goes in a little deeper and talk about how everyday people deal with death. Most of the time in film, death is exaggerated for the plot. In reality, people are not too dramatic. Throughout time, people has a huge fascination with death. People wonder whether death being the end of the journey in life, a lot of religion also tells that there are life after death, be it heaven, hell or rebirth. No one knows for sure and that might be one of the reason for the curiosity of the mystery of death.

A lot of people want to believe that there are life after death, hence, belief of ghost or rebirths are very common throughout many cultures. Many people are afraid that death would be the end of everything and it frightens people a lot. A void after you take your very last breath. Would it be meaningless to do good or evil because we might be reduced to nothingness.

Departure shows a very different perspective of death, it reminds people, although after an individual is no longer in the world of the living but their deeds and memories lives on. The job of the encoffiner in Japanese are family members in the age of the old. However, in the modern generations, it turned into a career for families to employ them to give their final respect and a form of rite to send them on their way in life. I find it beautiful, it triggered personal memories of my late grandfathers and the rites of our religions, it did not only help my late grandfathers depart the world of the living but the priest and minister reminds us of the memories we have with them (the departed) and these memories immortalize them and they continue to live on in our memories.

I recommend everyone to watch the film and it has a lot of touching moments.