Rinko Kikuchi stars in this film about a woman who undergoes a bit of an identity crisis. Kikuchi, who was nominated for a supporting-actress Oscar for Babel, delicately portrays a Japanese woman, Kumiko, who mistakenly believes that the Coen brothers’ film Fargo is a true story. She repeatedly watches a scene in which Steve Buschemi buries a suitcase full of money. Kumiko devises a plan and ultimately leaves Japan in search of this illusive treasure.
The film opens with the intro to Fargo which indeed starts out with the words, “This is a true story.” There is bit of play going on here, since Kumiko, The Treasure Hunter is loosely based on a real life event that morphed into an urban legend. Kumiko’s premise is rooted in a story that began circulating after a Japanese woman was found dead in Minnesota in 2001. While the urban legend that the Japanese woman died searching for hidden treasure turned out to be false, the Zellner brothers illuminate the myth through Kumiko’s tragic journey.
Kumiko is almost always wearing her red hooded sweatshirt, and she sticks out like a sore thumb in a washed-out Japanese cityscape of black, white and grey. When she sets out on her quest, her red hood conjures the image of Little Red Riding Hood. And while Kumiko believes she is a conquistador, the viewer can’t help but feel a sense of foreboding—that Little Red is headed down the wrong path to Grandma’s house.
Kumiko’s life in Japan is kind of solitary confinement, but her quest does not promise to provide a brighter future. While Japan is full of dark colors, Minnesota is whitewashed and deathly cold. Kumiko, like the Minnesota terrain is equally frozen inside. During the entire film, we see a woman whose only hope in life is to find a suitcase full of money. This desire becomes an all-consuming passion that blinds Kumiko to the less obvious treasures and daily graces that she encounters on her quest.
Kumiko puts a great deal of money and effort into pursuing what she believes to be a valuable treasure. In addition to learning what Kumiko really wants, we also get to know Kumiko and what she really needs. Because of a language barrier, Kumiko spurns genuine hospitality three times without even knowing it. Each time, the hospitality that is shown to Kumiko is interpreted as merely an obstacle to be overcome in order to attain her primary goal. Even the bait and switch of the two evangelists she meets when she first reaches Minnesota is not without merit. The evangelists’ declaration that they were once on the wrong path silently begs the question: Is Kumiko on the right one? The larger question that one cannot keep from asking is whether or not a suitcase full of money is worth the sacrifices that Kumiko is prepared to make.
Kumiko invites us to reflect on some fundamental questions. What is the right path and what in this world is of ultimate value? Kumiko is a treasure hunter. It would be easy to right her off as a misguided fool, but that would be a mistake without first considering how Kumiko represents all human beings. Is Kumiko the only person who is consumed with a longing that this world can never satisfy? While Kumiko believes that the fictional world of the film Fargo is real, she is not the only person who lives within a world view that is more fairy tale then fact? Like Kumiko, the perennial desire to obtain the unattainable is part of being a member of the human race.
While there are comic moments to be sure, this film is more of a tragedy than a comedy. Like Kumiko, our lives too are ultimately tragic if our primary desires are to be inevitably thwarted. But as Christians, we believe that while some desires will remain unfulfilled, there is one that will ultimately be satiated. In Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis asserts that, “If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world.” No suitcase full of money will satisfy the longing of the human heart. But there is “a treasure that neither moths nor rust can destroy” (Matthew 6:20).
You might also find this review of Kumiko, the Treasure Hunter helpful: