Neo Sora’s first fantasy fiction feature film

At the beginning of “Happyend,” writer/director Neo Sora’s confident narrative feature debut following his revealing documentary about his late father, “Ryuichi Sakamoto: Opus,” we see a group of young people running through the silent streets of Tokyo after the police break up an underground party. Things could have been disastrous if two of them hadn’t created a diversion so they could all escape, but they scream with excitement as they leap into the darkness of the night before everything stops and they’re all frozen in time.

Accompanied by Lia Ouyang Rusli’s soundtrack, the credits slowly fade in and out. It’s as if we get a fleeting glimpse of the joy of youth that we can already sense is coming to an end. Their world expands and shrinks as they face adulthood while struggling with the increasing repression around them.

While Seo doesn’t freeze a moment like this until the very end, the way his quietly moving film transforms into a film about surveillance, scrutiny, sadness, and trying to find release in it all infuses the entire film with a similar sense of weightier thematic substance. Though few of his characters appreciate it now, these moments in time are precious and are increasingly upended by the changing forces of the world. By observing this with them, the film becomes a poetic portrait of youth as well as a truthful encapsulation of how life’s pains disrupt bursts of joy.

The film, which screened at the Toronto International Film Festival, is set in a near-future Tokyo, where the possibility of being hit by devastating earthquakes worries everyone. At the same time, government surveillance is increasingly present in the lives of young people, with those most targeted being those who are considered foreigners. Even if they have lived there for years, as is the case everywhere in the world where xenophobia is on the rise, anyone who does not fit the narrow definition of what it means to be Japanese is scrutinized. This extends to the installation of cameras in schools.

In the midst of it all, best friends Yuta (Hayao Kurihara) and Kou (Yukito Hidaki) must, along with their charming gang, Tomu (Arazi), Ming (Shina Peng), and Ata-chan (Yuta Hayashi), navigate this ever-changing world while trying to make sense of their futures. While many YA movies are woefully out of touch with reality in the way they show their characters interacting with one another, “Happyend” is clever and insightful, without ever going overboard. The film simply lets us spend time with the characters as they play along with a prank that turns out to be a central part of the story and ponder what will happen next once school is over. It’s a more relaxed-paced coming-of-age story that’s then injected with existential urgency.

Some, like their classmate Fumi (Kilala Inori), begin to fight back against the new surveillance, but “Happyend” is never a conventional thriller. Instead, it’s often deeply funny, as in an early scene where Ata-chan gives the camera the finger or when they begin to cheat the system by finding its blind spots. This is speculative fiction rooted in the real lives of these kids, because once the cameras become more normal, we begin to see how they reshape the dynamics of the school.

Without ever specifying it, Sora shows that this surveillance is not a neutral way to discourage bad actions or catch troublemakers. On the contrary, it is something that begins to weigh on all teenagers in a world already heavy enough with imminent goodbyes and constant earthquakes.

All of this is often filmed at a physical distance by cinematographer Bill Kirstein, who has worked with Seo on his previous films, with key revelations occurring in conversations where the characters are far from the camera. We hear them talk about things with their backs to us and their faces turned away, as if they can’t face their friends when they’re talking about painful subjects. Importantly, this doesn’t alienate the audience from the characters, as they’re actually drawn deeper into their corner of the world as they’re shown wandering the beautifully filmed streets trying to piece together what their futures will be. Whether in the abandoned hideouts they retreat to or the chilly hallways of their now perpetually camera-watched school, there’s still an earned warmth that catches you off guard.

Seo unearths universal truths that transcend all generational and cultural divides. The many geographic, social, and emotional pains these young people face are ones that everyone faces. As they find ways to combat it, realizing all the many ways they can’t do so easily, there’s something both heartfelt and quietly haunting about it all. We see so much in each of these brave young people who are stifled but still bursting forth, with all the actors giving some of the most naturalistic youthful performances you’ll see in a film all year.

There’s room for joy in Seo’s vision, and the music does wonders for that, as does the melancholy. When we then have another frozen moment in time near the finale, one only wishes we could bottle up everything that was captured. Much of life’s suffering comes from the impossibility of that, but that only makes films like this all the more essential. We can never pause time in our own lives, but films like “Happyend” can do so in small ways, never omitting the stifling parts of existence the way they do the sublime.

Seo’s debut is also worth cherishing and we can only hope that it will be the first glimpse of a long series.