A single mother learns that her 5th grade son is being bullied by his teacher. When she lodges a complaint with the school, she is met with plenty of apologies but no explanation. As the situation unfolds, it becomes clear that the truth is being obscured about her son, the teacher, and a mysterious classmate.

Hirokazu Kore-eda has a long career of exceptional cinema stretching back several decades, yet it is only in recent years that his international reputation has grown to match the one he enjoys in Japan. His films now seem guaranteed to get broad global releases and awards consideration. The latest, Monster, is currently screening at the Melbourne International Film Festival after its acclaimed Cannes premiere earlier this year. It is notable in being Kore-eda’s first directing work since 1995 that was written by someone else, with a screenplay by TV veteran Yuji Sakamoto. Despite this, in terms of content and tone Monster has Kore-eda all over it. It is another emotive story of family crises intersecting with the life of a child.

The film employs a triple narrative where the perspective of one protagonist blinds the viewer to the truth about another. In the film’s opening stretch, widowed mother Saori (Sakura Ando) notices odd behaviour by her son Minato (Soya Kurokawa) that leads her to discover he is being harassed and physically assaulted by his teacher Mr Hori (Eita Nagayama). The details of the affair do not make sense, however, and this leads to a repeat of the narrative from Hori’s point of view. With a fresh perspective and additional information, one mystery gets replaced by another – and a third run through the story is required through Minato’s eyes to finally get to something approaching an objective truth.

The film is rich in strong performances. As is always the case with Kore-eda’s work, it is the juvenile performances that stand out the strongest. Soya Kurokawa is an immediately and deeply sympathetic lead as Minato, and for much of his section of the film he is well matched against Hinata Hiiragi as quiet classmate Yori. Mystery elements foreshadowed in earlier sections of the film are well placed, leading to great satisfaction in unravelling them during the climactic act. Ando and Nagayama are both excellent in support, working deftly with a screenplay that requires ambivalence and then clarity from the same situations.

Kore-eda uses his own well-established style, shooting from arms length and highlighting the performances over any kind of excess visual style. When the film employs Ryuichi Sakamoto’s gentle score (his last before dying earlier this year) it does so sparingly, and for maximum impact. It allows the film’s deeper meanings and subject matter to emerge organically and with a carefully measured pace.

Surprisingly, much of this technique and delicacy actually saves the film from Sakamoto’s screenplay. The triple mystery structure, while cleverly composed, gets in the way of the actual plot. It is a puzzle for its own sake, that requires more than a little illogical behaviour to work on a structural level – let alone to illuminate or explore the characters. Without it, the film would be much simpler but could have found room for more depth. Instead the actors are forced to do a lot of figurative heavy lifting to compensate. It is still a marvellous, very beautifully composed feature, but the fussy screenplay drags it from another Kore-eda masterpiece down to simply being very, very good.

Monster is currently screening at the Melbourne International Film Festival. Click here for more information.