As "Nobody Knows" opens, we watch a mother and two kids moving into a new apartment. They wrestle some heavy suitcases up the stairs. When the movers have left, they open the suitcases and release two younger children, who are a secret from the landlord. "Remember the new rules," the mother says. "No going outside. Not even on the veranda -- except for Kyoko, to do the laundry."Kyoko is the second oldest. about 10. The oldest, a boy named Akira, is about 12. He regards his mother with guarded eyes. So do we. There is something too happy about her, as she acts like one of the kids. It is not the forced happiness of a person trying to keep up a brave front, or the artificial happiness of someone who is high, but the crazy happiness of a person who is using laughter to mask the reality of her behavior. It fools the little kids, Shigeru and Yuki, who are perhaps 7 and 4.The mother, named Keiko, played by a pop star named You, leaves Akira some money and goes away. She returns very late at...
