‘The Day of the State Funeral’ bears witness to the end of the Abe era

He was the most consequential politician of his generation, a polarizing figure who nonetheless became Japan’s longest-serving prime minister. You’d think the assassination of Shinzo Abe in July last year would have been an epochal moment. Instead, it seemed to fade away almost as soon as it had happened.

When a state funeral was eventually held in September, despite widespread public opposition, Abe’s demise had been overshadowed by the death of Queen Elizabeth II. Given the accusations of memory-holing that had dogged his administration, it was perhaps fitting — but the muted response also reflected the anemic state of political discourse in Japan.

This is a running theme throughout Arata Oshima’s “The Day of the State Funeral,” a vivid snapshot of the events of Sept. 27, 2022. While the director’s earlier “Why You Can’t Be Prime Minister” (2020) spanned a 17-year period, here he uses a single day as a window into the state of the nation. Chronicling the occasion in the manner of a TV news station, the film dispatches cameramen to locations throughout the country, where they interview members of the public and try to capture the ambient vibe.

At the scene of Abe’s shooting in the suburbs of Nara, people stop to say prayers or lay an offering, while camera crews hover. Aside from a young man who remembers high-fiving the politician (“It was a very magnanimous hand,” he recalls), the mourners are mostly older. However, that’s also true of the protestors marching in Tokyo, or obstructing traffic outside a construction site for a U.S. air base in the Henoko district of Nago, Okinawa.

The latter are some of the few people interviewed in the film who seem able to articulate a clear political viewpoint, although this may also reflect where Oshima’s own sympathies lie. More typical is a woman in Nara who talks about how “relatable” Abe was, but clams up when asked how she rated him as a politician.

The ceremony is only ever glimpsed on TV screens, but we see all that was happening on the sidelines: the protestors hemmed in by police on the streets near the Nippon Budokan, the lines of well-wishers bringing floral tributes. Long stretches of the film adopt the observational mode of Frederick Wiseman, with a languid atmosphere that underscores how little the funeral registered with much of the general public.

In Shimizu, Shizuoka Prefecture, which had been hit by heavy flooding several days earlier, the residents clearly have more important things to worry about. But the communal spirit on display in these scenes at least inspires a sliver of confidence about Japan’s future.

So, surprisingly, does an appearance by director Masao Adachi (a onetime collaborator of Oshima’s father, Nagisa), who somehow managed to make a docudrama about Abe’s killer in less time than it took to organize the state funeral. During a Q&A session held after a screening of “Revolution+1” — which took place at the same time as the ceremony — the octogenarian firebrand disarmingly tells his audience they need to “think about love.”

However, he also admits to being keen to undermine official efforts to give a “nice and tidy” ending to the Abe era. In its own way, “The Day of the State Funeral” serves a similar purpose. Oshima’s documentary is an important act of bearing witness. It’s a film to get people talking.