Posted: 11/01/2011

The Hariyama Bridge

(2009)

by Ruben R. Rosario

Now available in a Blu-Ray/DVD combo pack from Funimation.

The Hariyama Bridge is a really solid debut from Aaron Woolfolk and an interesting entry into Funimation’s live action catalog. Daniel (Ben Guillory) is trying to cope with the untimely death of his son, Mikey (Victor Grant). The two were estranged and Mikey was living in Japan at the time of his death. Daniel decides it would be best for him to go and retrieve some of his son’s artwork that’s still in Japan and bring it back home. As he travels to the eastern country, he is bombarded by a culture shock, as well as facets of his own son’s life that he had no idea about.

The film’s emotional content come from the fact that Woolfolk himself has experienced Japanese culture first hand and lived in Japan for some time teaching English. The sensibilities of the film are very much inspired by Japanese traditional filmmaking, with it’s wonderful landscape shots as the serene aspect of Japanese culture. Ben Guillory does a fine job with Daniel’s character, as he is not only dealing with the loss of his son and having to deal with the disconnect from American society whilst in Japan. As a film about loss and redemption amongst family, The Hariyama Bridge succeeds, as well as the problem of preconceived notions of other cultures and issues of racial identity in the African-American community.

The video on the Blu-Ray is presented in an MPEG-4, AVC encoded, 1080p transfer, with an aspect ratio of 1.78:1. The Hariyama Bridge is absolutely gorgeous on Blu-Ray and showcases some really terrific cinematography by Masao Nakabori. Everything from the greenery in forest tops to just a few characters sitting at a dining room table, the film is breathtaking. The level of detail in The Hariyama Bridge is wonderful and is an absolute treat on Blu-Ray. The DVD that’s included is the same presentation, just in a smaller resolution, but still looks wonderful.

The audio on the Blu-Ray for The Hariyama Bridge comes in an Dolby True HD English and Japanese 5.1 track and a Dolby True HD English and Japanese 2.0 track. While there isn’t much going on, due to the film being a drama, the Dolby HD mixes are extremely impressive. All of the dialog, score and minimal sound design are all very well balanced and placed wonderfully. The English that some of the Japanese characters speak is sometimes hard to understand, but still works out okay.

Funimation has been bringing a lot of well made live action titles and The Hariyama Bridge is another healthy addition to that list. The fact that this film deals with really strong issues and tells a moving story, it’s an amazing effort by Funimation presenting it to the masses.The special features included are a real gem and make full use at getting behind the scenes with great commentary by Woolfolk, as well as great behind-the-scenes of The Harimaya Bridge. Aaron Woolfolk has done an amazing job at making his first feature film a powerful one. I’d like to hope in the future he continues to do so and really dig deep into what makes us truly human. Highly Recommended!

Ruben R. Rosario is a graduate from Columbia College Chicago with a degree in Audio for Visual Media. He works as a freelance location sound mixer, boom operator, sound designer, and writer in his native Chicago. He’s an avid collector of films, comics, and anime.

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