2008 / Yojiro Takita > It’s so fitting that when the Academy finally honors an Asian work with the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film, the crown is worn by a bastion of studio-laced mediocrity. Departures reminds you over and over that you’re watching a carefully directed art film that has symbolism and emotions and all that other good stuff that separates it from the barrage of mainstream dramas. But as successful as it is in conveying the little artifacts of daily life, it’s equally as frustrating in forgetting to treat the viewer with the kind of respect necessary for this to be a mutually enjoyable experience. There’s an elegant humanist setup to the whole show that gets sideswiped in the second half by an overarching approach of connect-the-dots that has just enough edginess to garner an awards shower that’d even make the Weinsteins proud. In a year where Japan had a couple of far better films (All Around Us, Tokyo Sonata), it’s sad that the global audience will judge the market with this caricature of human development.