Juonikuvaukset(1)
Naoki from the Japanese city of Yamagata is in his forties and lives in a small oneroom apartment with his girlfriend Yoshi, who is half his age. Before the economic crash in 1992, he was a successful man with a new BMW and several prospering family businesses. In the course of one day, however, he found himself on the street and his family turned its back on him. Consequently, Naoki has changed his lifestyle: he works part-time in the post office and he devotes the rest of his time to housework. Despite this, however, his daily shift amounts to seven hours and Yoshi works fifteen hours a day in three jobs in the non-traditional role of breadwinner. Such differences begin to test their relationship… This film focuses on a side of Japan that we for the most part don't know about. It looks at the everyday life of people earning the minimum necessary to survive. This socially critical documentary paints this society, which is geared towards productivity, in a different light, and shows how shining examples of industriousness can turn into exhausted wrecks. Will Naoki and Yoshi's love pass muster in an era of unrelenting capitalism? (One World)
(lisää)Arvostelut (1)
This documentary is as sharp as a razor and ruthless as the goddess of revenge. The director says at the beginning that he wanted to map out what drives Japanese society. He didn't quite succeed in that, but on the one hand, he came up with a very interesting character and life story, and on the other - and this is mainly what he managed to reveal - what Japan, as a collectivist society where the main requirement is not to lose face, carefully hides. That means the unsuccessful part of its society, poverty, which has its repulsive side and has no support in social institutions. The protagonist of the film lost his livelihood after the economic crash in 1992 and now relies on his partner, and this is a terrifying handicap from the perspective of traditional Japanese values... Overall impression: 85%.
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Kuvagalleria (1)
Kuva © Lombardo Films
