Donald Richie was an American in Japan, puzzled by the differences between the two cultures at a time when Japan's economic star was rising and it seemed poised to overtake America's place in the world. This film, based on his writings in the 70s, is a worth seeing not because of any particular insightfulness on the part of Richie, but rather because of the beauty that the camera captures. The fact that we have a unreliable, sometimes unpleasant, guide through that beauty adds another layer of interest.
Richie makes it clear that he's an essentialist and a cultural conservative, judging modern Japanese culture to be somehow inauthentically Japanese, whatever that means. He talks about his desire for sex during his travels and laments the fate of a Japanese 15-year old girl, whom he judges to be "both an adult and a child", since she will soon be married and forget "what it was like to be 15, with the whole world inviting." It's a disturbing juxtaposition when written by a 50-year old and read aloud by a 70-year old Richie.
In the end, I think this documentary shows Richie to be a self-obsessed old man -- self-consciously so -- who isn't really interested enough in Japan or its inland sea to perceive it as anything other than an opportunity to reflect on himself and his choice to isolate himself in a country where it's difficult to find acceptance as a foreigner.
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