Aardvark (Kitao Sakurai, 2010): USA / Argentina

Reviewed by Paula Gomez. Viewed at the AFI Film Festival 2010, Hollywood.

Kitao Sakurai’s Aardvark is an awkward, hilarious and amazingly brilliant movie. It tells the story of Larry (Larry Lewis Jr.), a blind man who goes on a journey of self-discovery along with Darren (Darren Branch), a friend he meets on the way. Larry meets Darren one day while walking down the street after going to his alcoholics anonymous meeting. He bumps into Darren and immediately starts a friendly conversation with him. The bond then grows stronger when Darren teaches Larry the martial art of jiu jitsu. The scenes that capture the twists, turns, and tackling that they do to each other at the jiu jitsu studio, reinforce the thematic role of friendship, trust, loyalty, and self-sufficiency in this movie. Its ending is hilarious and I won’t tell you what happens so as not to spoil it for you if you haven’t seen the movie yet, but it is enough to say that everybody gasped, laughed nervously and was shocked at the theater when they experienced the ending of this film.

Several of the decisions made to put this movie together were happy accidents, as revealed at the Q & A by the director, even until the moment the movie was screened. At the theater, somewhere in the middle of the plot, all of a sudden the visuals went off from the screen and the audience was left hearing the diegetic and non-diegetic sounds but interpreting in their own mind what the visuals must have been about… just as if they were inside Larry’s mind. Wouldn’t that have been an extraordinary move by the director if it had been intentional? When the director warned the public that those techniques were unintentional the staff attempted to fix the screening, but instead another happy accident occurred when this time the sound went off and the visuals remained on the screen. The audience laughed it off and then clapped, but on a serious note they were left to think a bit about the role our senses play in experiencing a movie and of grasping its contents.

How do we see a brilliant work of art? With one eye, with two eyes, with our gut or with all of our senses mixed together and a bit of courage? This film is unlike any other film I’ve ever seen because it tells the story of a blind person who happens to be blind in real life. It is not at all like watching the movie Ray because we know that Jamie Fox is not blind. Somehow, knowing that the actor portraying a blind man is truly blind allows us to sympathize with the actor and believe the world of the movie a bit more. This movie is very much worth your time. Just watching it for the ending alone is worth your time. People who are blind might enjoy listening to it. People who are interested in the science of perception might enjoy it too. And lastly, people who are fascinated by human interactions that evolve into devoted friendships might enjoy it as well.