Sawako has been living in Tokyo for five years and is now on to her fifth job and fifth boyfriend. Rather than happy she is resigned to her fate, devoid of all dreams and hopes; a complex of symptoms which even her colonic irrigation therapy does nothing to improve. When her father falls seriously ill in her hometown, her boyfriend Kenichi, who relies on her as a substitute mother for his little daughter Kayako, decides that the three of them should move to the country and take over the father's clam business. But in her hometown Sawako has a reputation as an ungrateful daughter who ran away from home. So she and her patchwork family are not exactly welcomed with open arms.
The film portrays this reencounter as a twist of fate in which issues of social background and gender roles come into play in some genuinely funny situations. The gentle Sawako doesn't seem to stand a chance against the gossip and this rough and crude environment, with its verbal abuse and heavy beer consumption. But is it really impossible to get the better of one’s social class and conditioning? Sawako sees her opportunity and seizes it. The only loser is he who allows himself to be turned into one. But here the fragile bloom of hope in the end turns into a gigantic melon.
Anna Hoffmann
Production: Pia Corporation, Tokyo; Tokyo Broadcasting System, Inc., Tokyo; Avex Entertainment Inc., Tokyo
Screenplay: Ishii Yuya
Camera: Okimura Yukihiro
Cast: Mitsushima Koichi, Endo Masashi, Aihara Kira, Shiga Kotaro, Iwamatsu Ryo
Format: 35mm (filmed on 16mm), color
Running time: 112 min.
Language: Japanese
