Ryuichi Sakamoto | Opus

Ryuichi Sakamoto walks into a studio and sits at the piano. He plays twenty pieces. There is nothing else: no audience, no speech, no archive footage. The recording was made in 2022, when he was dealing with cancer and no longer had the strength to give a concert. It was his last performance and he died in 2023. Neo Sora directs. He is Sakamoto's son. The film is black and white and takes place in one room. The camera moves little; the close shots stay on the hands, the face and the pedal. The pieces are chosen from across his career. Film music such as Merry Christmas Mr Lawrence and The Last Emperor, the Yellow Magic Orchestra period and pieces from his last albums come in turn, in an order he chose rather than a chronological one. The conditions of the recording are inside the film. Sakamoto could play a few pieces a day and the shoot spread across several; the trace of that is there, with the breathing and the pauses left uncut. Sakamoto was the best known Japanese composer in film music and is remembered for an approach that joined western and eastern music. The last piece is never played; the camera stays on the empty piano. Who it is for: listeners of Sakamoto and viewers who like concert films. Who it is not for: no context is given, there is no narrative, and without knowing the composer the film is only a piano recording.