Chapter Nine – Arrival
Looking across a large room filled with passengers. There is marble flooring and walls with concrete pillars at intervals. Several slow moving queues snake across the room towards a row of desks in glass booths along one wall. Exits to an adjoining room are behind the row of booths. Signs above the desks read "Controllo Passaporti."
Cut to:
A tracking shot – the camera moves slowly along a queue of people. We see them in profile. For the most part they are tired and fed up.
Cut to:
A view of Seiji and Shizuku. Side by side they face us. We see only their heads and shoulders at first and the camera then slowly zooms out. At waist height we see they have a luggage trolley with them. Their hand luggage is on it. They both look shattered, ready for sleep. Nothing happens at all in the shot for 10 seconds. Then Seiji turns his head to his left. Another actionless few seconds. Then we see the upper half of a blue suitcase slide past in front of the couple. After a gap half a big black hold-all slides by, then the top half of a red suitcase. There is no reaction on the couple's faces. Seiji turns his head back to look in front again.
Two men in suits walk behind them in the background. They both pull weekend bags on wheels.
Cut to:
Looking down on Seiji and Shizuku from an oblique angle. They are stood by the baggage claim carousel. Luggage slides past on the conveyor. Other passengers, equally animated, wait to either side.
A sign hangs from the ceiling. In several languages it shows "Ritiro Bagagli" or "Baggage Reclaim."
Cut to:
Shizuku walking, she is tired. The room behind her is of similar uninspiring architecture to the rooms in the airport we've already seen. Zoom out a little to see Seiji walking beside her. He is pushing the trolley with their bags on. He looks equally shattered. They pass a green sign "Controllo Dogana, Niente da Dichiarare" "Customs Control. Nothing to Declare."
Cut to:
A man in a cheap dark suit with greasy hair and a thin moustache. He holds a piece of cardboard with AMASAWA printed on it by hand in black marker pen. He's craning his neck, trying to get a better view over the people coming out of customs control. When he's not driving taxis he looks like he might be a used car salesman. Or a mafia debt collector.
Cut to:
A view behind Seiji and Shizuku walking in a crowd out of customs. We can see the greasy taxi driver bouncing up and down in the distance behind a row of other taxi drivers holding name boards. Seiji sees him and sees his own name written on the card.
Seiji: "Here's our driver, c'mon, let's go."