Year: 2024

Runtime: 103 minutes

Directed by: Shiori Itō

By Sarah Manvel

It’s rare, but not unheard of, for the subject of a documentary to also be its director. It’s also rare, but equally not unheard of, for an alleged rape to be the crime at the center of scandal. But it’s very rare indeed for an alleged crime to be at the center of two scandals. But this is what happened to young journalist Shiori Itō, when she was allegedly raped by a much more powerful and older journalist in a Tokyo hotel in April 2015. The first scandal was that of the weakness of the Japanese legal system when it comes to handling sexual crimes, and the second scandal was that the alleged rapist was allegedly protected from prosecution due to his undeniable connections with the prime minister. So Ms Itō found herself in the middle of a national firestorm when she chose to go public in May 2017 with the details of the crime and her allegations of a cover-up. But as “Black Box Diaries” makes clear, Ms Itō has always thought of herself as a journalist instead of a victim, meaning that her situation was material to be reported on, not just her life. The footage and research she compiled is now this incredible documentary, “Black Box Diaries,” about what is possible when someone is brave enough to speak truth to power, as well as the cost of being this courageous. 

For it is an unhappy fact that Ms Itō’s family were unsupportive of her attempts to seek justice for the crime done to her. It’s an equally unhappy fact Ms Itō’s bravery has, almost single-handedly, changed Japanese society’s attitudes to sexual violence. She is considered the center of the Japanese #MeToo movement, for example, a position no one would take by choice. And as that movement took the world by storm years into Ms Itō’s ordeal, while she was initially isolated she was very much not alone. At one point when her legal team discusses the possible blowback from one potential course of action, one of the lawyers smiles and says, “Bring it on.” Her case is also discussed in the Japanese parliament, both as an example of the failures of the legal system but also as a highly charged political football. It’s no wonder that Ms Itō has to check her apartment for wiretaps and occasionally stay elsewhere for her own safety. But she is also surrounded by many people keen to stand with her, including the publishers who risked expensive libel lawsuits to publish her memoir, “Black Box,” in 2017.  And remarkably, things do change. After her memoir comes out, Ms Itō meets a group of women journalists who proceed to tell their own harrowing stories and thank her for her courage in a scene so emotional as to be nearly unwatchable. 

Not everyone is as good, of course. One of the policemen who took her initial complaint and who purported to be on Ms Itō’s side is caught on film drunkenly asking her out on a date. Old women discussing her story over loudspeaker in the street, who Ms Itō encounters by chance, are remarkably callous to her face. Worst is the appalling sight of Ms Itō’s mother speaking against her to a wall of reporters. But Ms Itō has an optimistic core, brave enough to take on the entire society out of the righteous belief that by telling the truth things could change for the better.

 It’s not perfect, of course; Ms Itō grants herself the right to skim over some of the toughest moments, and the movie in no way provides the kind of objective reportage talking-head-style documentaries purport to offer. Instead “Black Box Diaries” is a memoir on film – showing us from the inside what it feels like to have your life ripped apart in this many different ways. Having someone else direct would not have enabled us to feel Ms Itō’s feelings directly. It’s a deeply rare and extraordinarily valuable movie.