SFF REVIEW: Kumiko, the Treasure Hunter (2014, Dir. David Zellner)

Fargo, the Coen Brothers' snow covered masterclass in black comedy opens with a beautifully crafted note to its audience:

THIS IS A TRUE STORY. 

The events depicted in this film
took place in Minnesota in 1987. 

At the request of the survivors,
the names have been changed. 

Out of respect for the dead,
the rest has been told exactly
as it occurred.

Kumiko, the Treasure Hunter, David and Nathan Zellner's love letter to Fargo opens with the self same note, albeit obscured by the static of a degraded video cassette.

There is an important distinction to be made here. The Coen Brothers' film wasn't actually, despite its claims, based on a true story, something the Coens admitted pretty much straight after the film's release. Though they invoke a respect for the dead, they are never actually beholden to it. The Zellners on the other hand are dealing with a true story, and one would like to think they would be somewhat respectful. Unfortunately, I'm not convinced they are.

In Tokyo, far away from North Dakota, a not-so-young office lady named Kumiko (Rinko Kikuchi) struggles with life. She's antisocial, she's uninterested and she's alone, unless you want to count her pet rabbit, Bunzo. Boxed into her tiny apartment, Kumiko obsesses about hidden treasures, which she routinely chases after, following her own hand-stitched treasure maps. Her latest fixation is the the case of money buried by Steve Buscemi under a fence just outside Fargo, which she plans to go after as soon as she's done with her sewing. Cue depressingly quirky road movie.

To lovers of Fargo, like myself, Kumiko, the Treasure Hunter, sounds like a promising addition to the canon, ready to sit along the Coens' film and the current television series. There are encouraging moments of intertextuality: the Zellners' tap freely into the Coens' off-kilter take on the American Upper Mid-West, just as musical outfit The Octopus Project competently riff on Carter Burwell's Fargo theme, but something doesn't sit right.

The film's depressive air dampens the brothers' attempt at black comedy, which more often than not misses the mark in its attempts to capitalise on cultural misunderstanding. The interactions between Kumiko and her would be Samaritans feel like unmotivated, one-sided grandstanding, Americana for Americana's sake, predominantly because the Zellners never give their protagonist anything more than her delusion to work with. Kikuchi's solid performance can only take Kumiko so far. She's riding a one-trick pony while the Zellners flog it to death.  Credibility isn't high on the agenda and in the end this infuriates. I wouldn't have been more than half an hour into the film before I began crossing my fingers for a swift end to Kumiko's treasure hunting adventure and a swift end to her along with it.

On reflection, what unsettles me most of all is that behind all this annoyingly facile urban legend fanning there is a real woman. Takako Konishi, the Japanese girl found dead near Fargo in 2001, was never looking for buried treasure. She was just lonely and depressed. She is not well served by this meagre portrait. I know that was never film makers' intention, and I may be unfairly projecting my disquiet on the film, but the Zellners knowingly set out to play in the space between reality and myth so they should at the very least try to be a little less trivial.

If they need help with that, film maker Paul Berczeller can show them how.

★★☆

Kumiko, the Treasure Hunter screened at Sydney Film Festival 2014.