The aesthetics of the 'deliberate blank' in anime

By deliberate blank, I mean artistic restraint which may be characterized as:

1) The thing that is deliberately left unsaid

For example, in Gilgamesh when Tatsuya asks Fuuko what she used to do for a living, she whispers something to his ear which the audience cannot hear, though the audience can see Tatsuya's facial expression of shock.

The overall effect of this is not unlike that of Henry James' short story The Turn of the Screw. In Jame' story, it is never spelled out what is the 'bad' and 'corrupting' thing which the ghost of Peter Quint (the male servant) taught Miles (the boy-master), not even when the boy-master seems to have spread that 'bad' and 'corrupting' thing to his classmates at boarding school and got expelled. However, it may be inferred indirectly that the taboo so abhorrent as to be unmentionable (in the Victorian context) is probably homosexuality, or more specfically sodomy.

To come back to Gilgamesh, I believe Fuuko was probably a child prostitute by the same analogy, since I cannot think of anything more abhorrent as to be unmentionable.

I rather like this sort of deliberate silence which engages the audience's imagination and powers of inference. Another example is the ending of Bakumatsu Kikansetsu Irohahihoheto, where Akizuki asks Kakunojou not to tell him her real and save it for the time they meet again. Such deliberate silence kills two birds with one stone - it makes the audience wonder i) what Kakunojou's real name is and ii) what their reunion would be like.

2) The scene that is deliberately not shown

In  Episode 25 of Samurai Champloo, Fuu is captured by some villain and there is a scene hinting at some sort of prelude to rape. We never see the rape (even though Samurai Champloo is not a series to be coy with 'adult situations'). We never know for sure if the villain was only teasing her or did proceed to rape her, and there is nothing that in the subsequent scenes where Fuu appears which suggests either.

I find the deliberately missing scene to be prevalent in some classic Japanese movies as well. In a number of Ozu Yasujiro's movies about marrying a daughter off such as Equinox Flower (1958) or An Autumn Afternoon (1962), the wedding scene is never shown. One would have thought the wedding ought to be the climax of such a movie, but instead, it is just not there. Such artistic restraint effectively leaves room for the imagination.

3)  The scenario that is within possibility but never happened

Plot-driven series (as opposed to character-driven series) tend to flirt with possibilities and makes the audience wonder what if. For example, The Legend of Galactic Heroes is full of questions of how the whole galaxy's history would have turned out differently if so-and-so had not died.

I think in the protagonists' plan to visit the sea in Honey and Clover II is another example, albeit an example of a different shade. Here the characters could vividly visualize in their heads what it would be like to visit the sea together, so much so that the visualization is burned into their memory. But the trip to the sea never takes place because of various subsequent incidents in their lives, and so all they vividly remember is a trip to the sea that is never realized...

I love these touches of deliberate blanks in anime, and would like to know if there are more examples along those lines. As usual, please do not hesitate to let me know if you can think of any.

Comments

[Owen S]

The "bad and corrupting thing" could have very well been masturbation, given the taboos attached to it for ages.

One recent 'deliberate blank' I can think of is Darker than Black's "the incident that everyone knows about": the characters search for a meteor fragment, Hell's Gate is seen to have a gaping crater in the middle of, and it doesn't take a long stretch of the imagination to infer that the appearance of Hell's Gate must've been caused by a meteor.

[Wabisabi]

You are right. It could have been masturbation as well. I just remember now that masturbation was a great taboo with the Victorians, what with the caution they gave to young boys that they would go blind if they 'disgrace' themselves.

As I said in my other comment, I dropped 'Darker than Black' after the 8th or 9th episode... but now I am interested again if only to find out what's so taboo about "the incident that everyone knows about" that it is only indirectly referred to.

[Ilsa]

it really is great topic to think about and discuss! i think that those deliberately unsaid/left out scenes just makes the story more personal, because everyone fills the gaps according to one's own feelings. from the scenes you mentioned, i think the one in Honey and Clover- the seaside trip scene left the biggest impact on me- it was beautifully painful. I can't think of one such scene in anime right now, but i recall ending of Lost in Translation movie, when audience can't hear what Murray's hero tells to Johanson's when they are parting.

[Wabisabi]

I tried to watch 'Lost in Translation' before but never made it past the first 15 mins....

You don't always get to fill in the blank though. Sometimes, the context of the story is such that there could only be one possibility, but its absence has a greater impact on the audience than it would be if it were shown, so it is left out.

[Ilsa]

i think i found an example from anime- the title is "Kigeki"- a short story about a girl who saves her village by hiring mysterious swordsman to kill the attackers. for his services she pays with a book- and it's never said what the book was- so it's purely up to viewer's spectaculations. also, the storyteller (the girl) states, that she won't tell some part of the story which makes it more legend-like.

[Wabisabi]

I know 'Kigeki'. I wondered what that book could possible be as well. ^-^

[NicholasBlack]

I believe 'Kigeki' relates somewhat to 'Name of the Rose'. The girl sais at some point that the swordsman probably came from an era when comedy books were forbidden. From what I could understand, the swordsman gives his services in exchange for old comedy books. When he receives the book from the girl, it is only after he is shown smiling that he agrees to help her. The actual name of the book... that remains a mystery. [Sorry for posting this so late, I have only recently seen 'Kigeki'.]

[minus-one]

- it's usual Japanese aesthetics, omission and vagueness (incompleteness). i love those blanks too ^__^

e.g.:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8TJmGtoURM8

in the final episode of Monster mother of twins says "i gave them names... their names are..." (but their names remain unknown).

[Wabisabi]

NicholasBlack:

You lost me a bit - do you mean Umberto Eco's book 'The Name of the Rose'...? I suppose comedy books would be a good guess.

Thank you for coming back to this post though - it is never too late. I have a comment feed and I always appreciate this kind of comment.

minus-one:

Thanks for the video clip but I would rather wait till I watch Monster for real. So no spoiler for me for the time being. ^-^

[Jordan S.]

There are "blanks" of a few different kinds, or something like them, in Takahata's Taiyô no Ôji: Horusu no Daibôken. Most could fall under the more standard categories of "dramatic irony" or "things we're led to think are one thing which turn out to be another" but one which really fascinated me was [spoiler]Hilda's wonder at how she can possibly be alive despite sacrificing her pendant. Unlike earlier in the film, she's now as bemused and in wonder at the situation as we are, though it can be understood as a metaphor which, though most likely the intention, I find brings it down somewhat.[/spoiler] Wong Kar-wai's 2046 has a similar moment when Chow Mo-wan meets Mimi/Lulu and finds that she has no memory of him. I find these moments supremely magical, though I'm not sure why. There may be something of the "slipstream" – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slipstream_%28genre%29 – effect in them.

Michel Ocelot's animation again have something which probably isn't quite the same… They often contain acts of violence such as rape and beheading which would be unthinkable in something aimed at children, but he gets away with it due to the way they presented, or obscured by the peculiarities of the medium.

[Wabi Sabi]

I can only comment on '2046' since it is the only thing you discussed that I have seen.

I thought Mimi/Lulu's memory slip was just one of those memory slips that the characters in a Wong Kar-wai film tend to have though (see 'Ashes of Time') - it's a Wong Kar-wai thing. Even if it is not the case, Mimi/Lulu is the type of girl who lives by pretenses. She may pretend that she does not remember.

Have you seen the alternative endings to 'In the Mood for Love'? Those are the magic parts, I think, that are all unfortunately excluded from the film proper.