Musuta Kusaka's Everyday Journey with Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Japan

If you finish watching a movie and start thinking about something that is out of character for you, then it’s a masterpiece. I found

myself thinking deeply after watching the documentary ” Eri Will Live With Everyone .”

https://eri-movie.com/

What is the meaning of life?

That kind of philosophy is not like me. But it’s not bad.

The protagonist of the film is Nishida Eri, a painter, poet, and employee of a social welfare corporation. She has a severe disability and spends almost all of her time in a wheelchair or bed. She is on a ventilator and receives assistance from care staff 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

This film is the story of Eri, the care staff, and her mother over the course of 12 years. The 90 minutes were carefully selected from the long film, so much so that director Terada Yasunori said, “I have no idea how long the camera was rolling.”

What is the meaning of life? Not only that, but also what is family? What is welfare? What is communication? And so on.

In any case, I think it is a work that contains a variety of themes and can be discussed in any way. So here I would like to introduce the interesting aspects of the film, focusing on three scenes that left an impression on me. This is a movie that I would like as many people as possible to watch, preferably with a loved one.

Like plucking a string. A delicate and mysterious conversation between fingertips.

What I remember most clearly is Eri’s conversation scene.

Due to her disability, she cannot use words orally. Since childhood, she has communicated with her mother and care staff through her eyes, facial expressions, and tone of voice. Furthermore, as her disability progressed, she had a tracheotomy and was put on an artificial ventilator. In other words, she even lost her voice.

But that doesn’t mean she doesn’t have words. Fingers. She and the staff member communicated with their fingertips. However. It was the first time I had seen a way of communicating, or rather a movement.

Eri and the staff member held hands. The staff member brought his other hand close to the hand he was shaking, as if playing a ukulele. I know it’s a very delicate movement, but it was still a strange one. What are they doing? How can they communicate like that?

I asked the director, who was on stage, and he took my hand and demonstrated it. Either hand is fine. The listener holds up their index finger. The speaker holds it up. This completes the pointing stick. The speaker uses the pointing stick to write letters like “a,” “i,” or “u” on the listener’s free palm. The listener senses the letters from this movement. When you’re nervous, you might write the character for “person” on the palm of your hand, but it’s like doing this in pairs. Finger talk.

When they’re in sync, it seems they can predictively convert the character into “Eri” just by making the movement of “e.” The plucking-of-strings movement was to sense the letters quickly and accurately. During the film, Eri told the staff, “I’m glad you’ve come back.” Was it the joy of a friend, or the relief of a person being assisted? These feelings may be inseparable for her.

The staff member replied, “There’s no way I’d forget about you, Eri-san,” as he gently wrapped his arms around her delicate, white fingers.

This scene clearly depicted a different relationship to me than that of “assisting/being helped.” It may be closer to a buddy or a comrade. If so, then not only protecting a life, but also entrusting one’s life to someone else is a battle.
Or perhaps their relationship is something that cannot be named. If so, then it is surely soft and unbreakable.

Could a relationship like this even exist? I was fascinated by the two of them, who were holding hands as if to confirm each other’s body temperature and exchanging something more than words with their eyes.

When Eri started living alone, what disappeared from the screen

Eri started living alone at around age 27. She moved away from her parents and relied only on a team of care staff. To be honest, I was surprised by this.

But she is a person of vitality. Her disability is not everything to her. She visited all 47 prefectures by the time she graduated from high school, she goes to the pool, she likes eating out and fashion, and she has experience working as a clerk at a recycle shop. She writes poetry, exhibits her paintings at art exhibitions, and even publishes books. In other words, she is a person of creativity.

So, to be honest, I wasn’t surprised. I could see the sparkle in Eri’s eyes, who lives away from her parents. She’s a young woman in her 20s, so it was a perfectly healthy excitement.

And here too, there was a memorable scene.

As soon as Eri started living alone, her mother Yoshie disappeared from her room. It was natural since she had become independent, but even so, her mother was not in the room. She was so absent that it bothered me.

Yoshie had literally poured her life into protecting and raising Eri. She had lived twice as long as anyone else, her own life and Eri’s life. It’s not just her. She also gave detailed instructions to the care staff, and sometimes she was strict. She was like an actress, and also the representative of a corporation, so she was quite powerful. It was scary.

If you watch the first half of the movie, you can understand that it comes from the feelings of a parent. You may empathize with her. That’s why I was so taken aback when Yoshie suddenly disappeared.

“Independence means having many people you can rely on,” one scholar said. I agree with that, but it must not be that easy in Eri’s case. Even so, Yoshie doesn’t interfere, doesn’t get in the way, and is so honest that she’s almost cold.

The camera captures the cheerful Eri-san and the care staff supporting her, filling the screen. There seemed to be no room for Yoshie-san to be reflected in the picture.

Most of the courage is mustered when no one is around. Especially if you decide to step down. Perhaps that was the case for her.

Mother, you’re doing a great job.

“This is paradise” After 20 years, a classmate’s words overlap in the final scene

I wrote that this film follows Eri’s life over a period of 12 years. However, that is only the period during which the director was filming. The film

also makes ample use of home videos of Eri’s childhood that her mother, Yoshie, had taken, saying, “I might use this someday.” “I never thought something like this would happen.” These are Japanese phrases that we would all like to say at least once.

Early in the film, in an era when cameras were just beginning to shift from tape to digital. The slightly grainy screen shows the Nishida family’s living room. The mother gives off a vestige of the bubble era. Eri is being held in her arms. Eri’s classmates are playing around the mother and daughter.

One of the girls says, as if soaking in a hot spring.

“It’s so relaxing here.”

Easy and blissful. I couldn’t help but laugh. However, I never imagined that those words would overlap with the final scene 20 years later.

Unfortunately, this film took a long time to shoot. It’s only natural that the care staff of “Team Eri” also change. Many of them quit due to marriage or childbirth. It’s good to see this happening.

However, being left by staff who are also skilled in medical care is literally a matter of life and death for Eri. At the end of the film, after many meetings and partings, Eri’s former staff return and they are reunited.

There is no way this film will end happily ever after. In fact, there was also a “special customer” who could only be filmed because of the super long-term close-up coverage…
“Wow! This is exactly the kind of happy ending that girl was talking about!” And then the end credits begin.

Eri’s room is surely not all peace and tranquility. Though it is calm, there is a constant sense of tension. There may even be the smell of disinfectant in the air. In the sense of clinging to life with all one’s might, one could even say that it is “the exact opposite of paradise.”

And yet, even now, about 20 years after that classmate’s words, her room may still be “paradise.” The very presence of the “special guest” in the last scene tells us why.

They meet, live together, and grow old, and then life connects to new life. It would be rude to give away spoilers. Please watch the movie to find out.

What is the meaning of life? When I watch “Eri Lives With Everyone,” I can’t help but think about it. But I’ve always disliked this question. I feel like I’m cutting off people who can’t ask this question.

On the other hand, Eri wrote in her book:

“My dream is for people to understand that my life is not unhappy, but happy.”

“Isn’t it important for society to have people who can say they are living happily?”

I don’t know what the meaning of life is. But this movie about Eri’s life certainly had meaning. The world definitely needs people who can say they are living happily. That is surely the same as we need people who sing about love.

For me, it’s my wife and daughter. I wonder if they feel happy. Before that, I should tell them that I’m happy.
This movie will be the trigger. I think I’ll watch it with the three of them next time.

This is a movie I would recommend to anyone who lives with someone special.