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having achieved anything. His wife is
law, Marianne. The stops on the way and dead, and his son is just waiting for Kanji
the encounters he has with people, force to die, so that he can get his hands on
Dr Borg to reminisce about his own life, his his property and pension. Then Kanji
emotionally distant mother, the woman he discovers he has cancer and very little
loved, who chose to marry his ne’er to well time left. He suddenly tries to look
brother, and his standoffish, middle-aged for pleasure in places he never went to
son. before. Eventually, he decides to help the
construction of a playground that had, for
Ikiru (1952): years, been caught up in a bureaucratic
An Akira Kurosawa masterpiece, the tangle. In the last moments of his life, he
Japanese film is about Kanji Watanabe sits on a swing at the park he built, and as
(played by Takashi Shimura) is a civil the snow falls, sings a song. The film is a
servant, close to retirement. He has lived tragedy about an elderly man learning how
a routine and monotonous life in Tokyo’s to live and get a sense of purpose, when it
public works department, without really is too late.
SENIORS TODAY | ISSUE #64 | OCTOBER 2024 31
