The weight of responsibility is very much on director Tadashi Nakamura’s mind throughout the process of making “Third Act.” He’s making a film about his father, Robert A. Nakamura, a giant of American independent cinema while trying to make his own mark on the medium outside of his father’s shadow. He’s dealing with sensitive topics that his family has mostly avoided talking about, while trying to make an unvarnished documentary about how circumstances shape an artist’s legacy. Tadashi Nakamura takes on a lot with “Third Act” since it’s a historical and educational documentary while also being a very personal story. He succeeds.
Nakamura, the father, was interned along with his Japanese American family during WWII, a shameful and disturbing period in 20th-century American history that has never been fully acknowledged or dealt with on a national level. Of course, that period in his life had a huge effect on his mental state. It is something that he has not discussed much. However, being in front of his son’s sensitive camera, he opens up. He talks of carrying self-hatred and trying to assimilate by being as white as he can when he was a young adult. Though he was in deep depression for most of his life, he found some solace in his work as a photographer and later as a filmmaker. Only in the 1970s, and within a larger civil rights movement, did he become an activist and advocate for the rights of Asian Americans.
This story is compassionately captured by Nakamura the son as he confesses his own struggles with identity as a young man. Tadashi Nakamura also tried to assimilate by playing football and trying to become the embodiment of all-American manhood. Only later did he embrace his familial legacy as a filmmaker. These personal narrative linkages make “Third Act” poignant for its makers but also for the audience, who can palpably recognize these emotional states and familial dynamics.
In addition to being a historical record of what the United States did to some of its innocent citizens, “Third Act” is a film about filmmaking. Discussions abound about the filmmaking process, what’s cinematic and what’s necessary to include or cut out. Nakamura does not hide the artifice of it all. While revealing his father’s diagnosis with Parkinson’s disease, he questions whether a camera should be present in what may become one of their last gatherings as a family. It’s essential to ensure his father’s legacy is preserved by making this film, but it also steals precious time.
Foremost in showing the strong bonds within this family is Karen Ishizuka, who’s wife to one Nakamura, mother to the other. An accomplished filmmaker who produced all of the older Nakamura’s films, she is also the glue that holds this film together. She’s frank and candid, secure with her life choices and comfortable in dealing with her husband’s diagnosis. In refusing to grieve for him before his time is over, she rescues “Third Act” from being a mournful documentation of a great man’s life. Instead, it’s a lively and moving portrait of a family that recognizes that despite all the hardships they have survived, they are lucky to have accomplished so much and luckier to be together.
As a filmmaker, Tadashi Nakamura seamlessly blends in all the different elements of this story. In making a film to document his father’s work and life, he manages to make a realistic portrait of America, with both its shameful history and its contemporary complexities. “Third Act” will open many eyes by educating the audience to what happened to Japanese Americans during WW2. And it will move many hearts by presenting a story of perseverance and how some people make their life’s work stand for more than just a personal accomplishment.
In one of the film’s first scenes, Robert A. Nakamura jokingly remarks to his son that they are making this film “to further your career.” Later in the movie, he questions some of the choices he made within his own films and wishes that he had shown “less history, more soul.” With “Third Act,” the Nakamuras, as a team, accomplish both endeavors.
