[CINÉMA] A missing part: divorces, child abductions in Japan

It is a real social problem that affects the land of the rising sun. Every year, 150,000 minors are kidnapped by one of their two parents. It is estimated, in fact, that two thirds of divorces result, in the short or medium term, in the deprivation of all contact between the children and the parent who has not obtained their custody…

A terrible injustice about to be corrected to the extent that, in May 2024, a law was passed, reforming the Japanese Civil Code, in order to allow divorced couples to opt for shared custody of their child. This law, supposed to come into force by 2026, is considered insufficient by many of its detractors, deploring the fact that parental kidnappings will remain criminally unpunished…

The case of Franco-Japanese minors

Guillaume Senez’s latest film, A missing parttreats the subject from the very particular angle of binational unions between a Japanese parent and a French parent. You should know, in this regard, that according to the OLES (Local Mutual Aid and Solidarity Organization) in Japan, between 60 and 100 minors are currently deprived of any contact with their French parent – ​​we remember , in particular, Vincent Fichot, this father who undertook, in 2021, a three-week hunger strike, near the Tokyo Olympic stadium, to protest against the kidnapping of his two children in 2018.

The story of the film follows Jérôme Da Costa, a former chef, played by Romain Duris, who remained in Japan after his separation from his wife in order to actively search for his daughter Lily, whom he has not seen for nine years. . Converted into a taxi driver, Jérôme (Jay to his colleagues) is about to throw in the towel and return to France permanently when one day, a work colleague cancels a trip. Jérôme agrees to replace him and realizes that his young passenger is none other than his daughter. Suffering from a sprain, she will not be able to walk to school in the coming days and therefore needs a taxi driver. Jérôme then seizes the opportunity and, unbeknownst to the mother, takes advantage of these short moments spent together to get closer to the little…

The figure of the courageous father

Second collaboration between Romain Duris and director Guillaume Senez, after Our battlesreleased in 2018, A missing part finds this theme of the father who struggles for his offspring, with the difference that in the previous film, the mother was absent, while in this one, it is the father who fights to be present and have the right to form a bond with her daughter, facing an unworthy and inconsistent mother. A fragile bond, given the situation of Jérôme, a modest French national in Japan, who owes the maintenance of his parental authority to his categorical refusal to divorce Keiko. A tactical choice which guarantees him a visa to stay in the country and the possibility of remaining close to Lily geographically.

Advised by Jessica, a French friend whose child was also taken away, Jérôme procrastinates, considering various solutions, but losing his little one again when he has only just found her is not one of them…

Moving and revolting at the same time, Guillaume Senez’s film has the great merit of tackling a subject which has never before been treated in cinema and undoubtedly offers Romain Duris one of the most beautiful roles of his career. We simply regret the musical choices of the filmmaker who is a little too fond, for our taste, of tearful songs in English – these were very unnecessary.

4 stars out of 5