Difference between revisions of "Sekai no Chuushin de, Ai wo Sakebu"

"I thought I might be using a lifetime's happiness in a moment. I was that happy and she was that beautiful." A young boy stands on the red earth of Australia under its blue sky. It is 17-year-old Sakutaro Matsumoto. His time with the girl comes back to him. The colored sand runs through his hands and a tear appears on his cheek. He wakes up. It's 2004 and he is 34 years old and in Japan. He thinks "I have been in a world without her for 17 years." Returning home to see his old high school for the last time before it is demolished, Saku confronts anew the loss of the love of his life, Aki, to leukemia 17 years ago. Now a medical researcher at graduate school, he has been living as if half of him died with her since then. Based on the bestselling novel that sold over 3 million copies, the past and present come together in this love story that is both pure and sad.

Review @ JFan

An Unforgettable Lost Love...

This was a popular novel and movie before it became a drama. You're going to have to forgive me this time, because I am writing this having never read the novel or seen the movie. I'm sorry that I can't make any interesting comparisons or tell you what they changed and what is the same. I am going to judge the drama on its own.

Matsumoto Sakutarou is an unmarried middle-aged man who has some type of job at a hospital (don't worry, it's not another hospital drama). It seems that he might have some health problems as he collapses at the beginning of the first episode. He's never been able to fall in love since high school, because he can never forget the girl he loved. Now, he lives only to keep her memory alive and he carries a vial of her ashes in his pocket wherever he goes.

File:Sekai3.jpg

Sekai no chuushin de, ai wo sakebu

The drama keeps flashing between the present, and back to the 80's when Sakutarou (Yamada) is in high school and falling in love with Hirose Aki. Their romance begins when their class is attending a funeral for a teacher and Aki is giving a speech in the rain. Saku uses his umbrella to cover Aki as she is giving her speech.

She begins to like him a lot after that. Saku begins listening to her favorite radio program, and even writes in a letter which is actually a story based on Aki, except that he adds in the detail that she has leukemia. He wins a Walkman cassette player for his letter, but Aki becomes furious with him for basing the letter on her, and especially adding in the part about the disease. For her birthday, Saku records an apology to her and gives it to her with the Walkman. She forgives him, and they begin exchanging an audio diary every day from that day on. The narration from the middle-aged version of Saku pops in and tells us that it was her last birthday.

All this time, Aki's father is opposed to her having a boyfriend because she is a senior in high school and needs to be preparing for her exams. She is also helping to organize the school's production of Romeo and Juliet, but they haven't yet decided who will play Romeo and Juliet.

The country setting is made to look very pleasant and tranquil, as in most dramas that take place in the countryside. Name always hangs out with his classmates Ryuunosuke and Akiyoshi at a small stand that sells takoyaki. And they drink coke out of those cool bottles that they used to use in the 80's. Ryuunosuke looks older than Saku and has a punk appearance with his slick hair. He's always offering love advice to Saku because he seems older than him (though he actually isn't). Akiyoshi is a kind of pathetic guy who lives in a temple. He wants to find a girl and marry her right away before his father forces him to become a Buddhist monk. In the first episode, he likes Aki too, but he gives up when he realizes that she likes Saku.

File:Sekai2.jpg

Sekai no chuushin de, ai wo sakebu

Saku's grandfather runs a small photo shop in town, and he is always begging Saku to come over and spend time with him. In the second episode, he tells the story of a girl he loved during the war before he married Saku's grandmother. He gets Saku to help him steal some of her ashes from her grave, so that when he dies they can be mixed together with his own so that they may be together in the afterlife.

The events of the story are given a lot of weight by the fact that we know Aki is going to die. The title means "Shout Love at the Center of the World". It's a very passionate drama about love that never dies, even decades after one of the two has passed away. It may not sound so interesting from the description above, but somehow the way it is presented is very good. There was a lot of commercial hype surrounding this title before it starting airing, and it lives up to the hype in my opinion.

I should probably see the movie too, but the drama on its own is quite good so far.

Source: JFan

Other Resources

@@ Line 10: / Line 10: @@
 ===Directed by===
 :[[Yukihiko Tsutsumi]]
 [[File:Sekai1.jpg|thumb|400px|Sekai no chuushin de, ai wo sakebu]]