JFF THEATER: The Miracles of the Namiya General Store (2017) | ナミヤ雑貨店の奇蹟 - Part II

Started watching on Friday night but I got involved doing other things and I had to postpone for viewing today instead.

So far, it looks like it is kind of a time travel story.  When the movie opens it shows you the Namiya General Store and you meet Mr. Namiya during the time when children are on their way home from school (I believe, I don't remember) There is a bulletin board with some notes on them and you see Mr. Namiya take one down, go into his store where he writes back and then he puts his reply on the board.

In the next scene, it is 2017 and you see 3 older teens running away and one of them tells the others he found an abandoned place where they could hide and it happens to be Mr. Namiya's store.  While they are in the store, someone places a letter in the slot from the front of the store.  The boys go out and look around to see who is there but there is nobody.  They get scared and decide to leave and go elsewhere in case they had been followed.  They run around the area and come to a spot on the street where they see a bus/trolley coming right at them.  The trolly runs over them as you see them so through the trolly with people sitting inside.  The trolly keeps going through them and disappears.  When the boys look around, they are right back in front of Mr. Namiya's store.  The boys go back in, read the letter and decide to answer it.  They place the reply in the side mailbox where someone comes and retrieves it.

At this point it seems like it was 2017 inside the store with events outside being 1981.  The letter they reply to is from a fishmonger/musician who was questioning his choice of having quit university to become a musician.  The boys reply back trying to guide him away from being a musician until the man writes back that music is not a hobby to him and he asks Mr. Namiya to listen to his song.  He places his letter in the slot but doesn't let it drop down.  He sits against the front gate, pulls out a harmonica and begins to play.  The boys inside recognize the song.  One of the boys says "Isn't that Suri's song?", and 2 of them run outside to see who is playing but there is nobody there.  When they go back inside, the song is still playing.

Cutting back to 1981 and the musician's life, his dying father advises him to keep doing what he loves after the musician says maybe he should join the family business and become a fishmonger.  His father tells him it would be one thing if he liked being a fishmonger but he knows he doesn't.  His father believed in him so he continued on his path.  Eight years later, his father has already passed, he is scheduled to play for some children in an orphanage.  At this orphanage there is a little girl and her young brother who were victims of abuse.  The little boy is so traumatized, he refuses to speak to anyone except his sister.  The musician ends up debuting a song he wrote.  There are no lyrics so he's just singing along with the melody.  The little girl asks him later what the name of the song he was singing was.  He reveals to her that it's his own song and he titled it Reborn.  

The next day, he hears the little girl, whose name is Suri, humming his song.  They go for a walk together and he is impressed that she remembered the whole song after having heard it only once. 

What happens next ties Suri, her brother and the musician, to one of the boys in the abandoned store.  In true Japanese fashion, there were tears. I mean, I cried.  Japanese dramas and movies never fail to leave me crying at least once while watching.  I won't go any further with what happened; go watch the movie yourself.  It is totally worth it.

JFF THEATER: The Miracles of the Namiya General Store (2017) | ナミヤ雑貨店の奇蹟

I have been missing a lot of really good J-dramas and J-movies on this site. I'm going to make sure I make some time to at least watch 1 movie on my 3 day weekends.

Today I am watching The Miracles of the Namiya General Store.  Synopsis from JFF Theater:

From the novel by HIGASHINO Keigo, three delinquents break into an abandoned store where anyone could leave a letter seeking advice.  Their arrival triggers the shop to connect with the past - old letters slipping through its mailbox.  Are these letters crossing time to reach them?  The three have no idea but write back regardless.  As they do, the store's secret is revealed, along with their connection to it, and the three, wrapped up in themselves for so long, find themselves connected to these strangers.  Having already helped so many before, will the store now help produce one last miracle?

Sounds interesting!  Here I go...

Kim Go-eun Movies

Back on my Asian drama blog, I made a list of dramas Kim Go-eun has been in because I've loved her since I watched Guardian: The Lonely and Great God!  So, it stands to reason that I need a list of movies she's been in so I can make sure I watch them all!  There have been quite a bit of them so I need to get going before I fall too far behind! 

2012 | Yeong-a (short film) | NEED TO WATCH

2012 | A Muse | NEED TO WATCH

2013 | Neverdie Butterfly (cameo) | NEED TO WATCH

2014 | Monster | NEED TO WATCH

2015 | Coin Locker Girl | NEED TO WATCH

2015 | Memories of the Sword | NEED TO WATCH

2015 | The Advocate: A Missing Body | NEED TO WATCH

2016 | Canola | NEED TO WATCH

2018 | Sunset in my Hometown | NEED TO WATCH

2019 | Hit-and-Run Squad | NEED TO WATCH

2019 | Tune in For Love | NEED TO WATCH

2020 | Untact (Short Film) | NEED TO WATCH

2022 | Hero | NEED TO WATCH

2024 | Dog Days (cameo) | NEED TO WATCH

2024 | Exhuma | NEED TO WATCH

2024 | Love in the Big City | NEED TO WATCH

After seeing this list, I need to get working on this ASAP because I haven't seen any of her movies at all!  

[2016] A Man and a Woman | 남과 여

I decided to watch this movie because of Gong Yoo.  I've loved him ever since I first saw him in Coffee Prince so I make it a point to watch his movies or dramas whenever I find them.  I should have skipped this one.

I didn't like it.  Any of it.

The movie starts in Finland with Ki-hong (Gong Yoo) and Sang-min (Jeon Do-yeon) dropping off their kids at a drop off area for a camp.  She asks if he has a light. They start to talk and decide to trail the kids to the camp. On the way back, there's a snowstorm and they end up having to get a room somewhere.  The next day, they go for a walk and find a sauna in the woods and they have a sexual encounter.  The next day, they go home and neither one knows the other's name.

Ki-hong is married and has a daughter.  His wife has mental issues and the young daughter (she might be about 5) suffers from depression.  He's unhappy.  After one of of his wife's breakdowns, her mother tells Ki-hong she is going to have his wife stay with her and she will take the granddaughter as well since she wants to be with her mother.  His MIL says she doesn't blame him because she's always had issues and she married too young.  They live in Finland due to his job.

Sang-min is also married and she has a son.  Her son has a learning disability and it's caused stress in the family.  She seems to be unhappy with her husband. She lives in S. Korea.  I think she was there for the special camp for her son but she had business as well.

So, due to their circumstances, they feel connected and they eventually meet again and start having an affair. Back in Korea, Sang-min decides to divorce her husband and goes back to Finland to be with Ki-hong but while she's there, she happens to walk by a cafe and through the window she sees him with his wife and daughter and he was happy.  She decides to walk away before he can see her.  He sees her back as she exits the door and at first he has no reaction because he doesn't realize it is Sang-min until he sees her profile as she gets into a cab.  His wife had left the table to use the rest room so he was with his daughter.  When he realizes the woman is Sang-min, he grabs his car keys and runs out of the cafe.  He was about to get into his car when he sees his daughter looking sad in the window.

I'll leave it there.  I left out a lot of detail but this is the gist of it.  The only thing that could have saved this movie for me was the ending and that did not go well for me. 

Free Japanese Videos at JFF Theater

Not sure how long ago I discovered this site that offers Japanese movies for free.  I believe the selections change every month.  I keep forgetting about this site until they send me an email to let me know there are new things to watch!  I just went through the list of what they have and there are a few I intend to watch.  

Their list of videos include the movies that are no longer available which doesn't make sense to me.  The first 2 or 3 pages are the videos that are "available to watch".  

Here is the link to JFF Theater's site!  Below are the ones I will be watching this month.

I'll start off with Come Back Anytime.

Organizing Movies & Getting into Chinese Movies

So, not too long ago I had said I wasn't going to be watching Chinese movies YET.  I think I said yet; I don't remember.  Anyway, I've decided to go ahead and start watching them.  Since I last mentioned Chinese movies, I've watched a couple of Cdramas and they were really good so I'm going to give Cmovies a shot.

I love that Netflix has so many Asian dramas to choose from.  Back in the mid 2010s, I had DramaFever.  I was in heaven with all the dramas they were able to get.  Then Warner Bros came and eventually shut it down.  It was the perfect site to get the best dramas.  Thank goodness we had Viki as a backup!  It filled a hole even though it wasn't quite the same.

When I got my Netflix account, I created 3 different profiles.  The original one was for all my American made shows and movies.  I had another one I labeled "International" where I kept a list of ALL my Asian dramas and movies and lastly, I created one just for Anime.  Today I created 2 new profiles.  One for my Jmovies and another one for "Other Asian" movies that will have K and C movies.  As I was adding movies to My List, I realized there were a few Kmovies I had watched but never added to my blog.  The whole point of my drama and movie blogs was more to keep track of what I've watched than a place to talk about them.  I liked making screenshots and posting them until the technology changed to prevent people from being able to "steal" shows/movies from online streaming services.  In doing that, it also prevented me from being able to make/take screenshots while watching movies/shows on streaming services.  No matter how technology changes, there is always a workaround.  I've done a half assed job of trying to find a way to make screenshots again but I haven't figured it out.  I have tried Googling and using suggestions but they don't work.  I don't have the patience or time to try harder at this time.  I know I could find someone who could probably help me out some but I kind of like doing it myself until I've exhausted all avenues and I'm not there yet.  

My movies are newly organized now.  I know there are probably 1 or 2 movies I've watched and I've forgotten about.  I still have all my movies and I'll need to look at them and see if I missed any.

I'm pretty sure which Cmovie I'm going to start with.  STAY TUNED!

Getting Back to Movies

 Yes, I have been gone from this blog a long time but I haven't stopped watching movies.  I've been watching a few but forgetting to come here to post about them.  I plan to do better.  I've been over on my drama blog trying to keep that one up to date as best I can as I get some free time.  I have no idea what movies I have watched since my last post so as of right now, once I can remember them, I will add them to my list.  

In the meantime, I'll find a new movie to watch soon!  Any suggestions?

[2022] The Last 10 Years

  I saw an ad on Facebook for a site called Mubi.  They used this movie to draw you in.  I could have sworn this was a site I had checked out before for a different movie but never got to watch because it wasn't available in my region.  When I clicked on the movie and got taken to the site, it ended up that it wasn't that same site after all.  Mubi is a different site and for signing up, I could get a week free so I can watch this movie but then it's $10.00/month to access the site.  I can't afford that.  I'm already spending way too much money for subscriptions to other movie/TV sites and I just can't do another one.

Luckily, I have a site where I can get lots of Asian movies/TV shows.  I went there and got this one after I read part of the synopsis.

I've watched a ton of Japanese movies and TV shows since the very early 90s and for the past 10 or so years, I've watched a lot of Korean movies and shows and a few Chinese.  I can tell you without a doubt, Japanese folks are really really good at making shows and movies that will rip your hearts out and leave you in uncontrollable tears.

I'm only about 15 minutes into this movie and nothing really major has happened except you find out why this movie is titled as such, and I am already feeling the knot in my throat and my eyes are getting teary.

[2007] How to Become Myself ~ Ashita no watashi no tsukurikata

Only reason I picked this movie was because of Narumi Riko.  Loved her in "1 Litre of Tears" as Aya's younger sister which made me watch her in "Ruri no Shima". 

In this movie, Narumi Riko plays the role of Oshima Juri.  I was a bit confused by this movie because when it starts, Juri introduces us to the popular Kanako and the bullied girl whose name escapes me and I cannot find it online.  Juri says she falls in the middle where nobody notices her.

Juri's home life is not happy. Her parents are constantly fighting but she plays the role of a dutiful daughter in the hopes that everything will fix itself.

It was a bit of an odd movie for me.  Perhaps I was tired when I watched it because I truly didn't get it.  I may watch this movie again in case I just happened to miss something.

Changing the Title

If you've been reading my drama blog you already know I changed it from J-dramas to Asian dramas since I started watching K-dramas and C-dramas.  Now I'm going to have to change the title here.  I've started watching Korean movies.  I don't think I'm going to watch any Chinese movies.  At least not yet.

Still Walking

I chose this movie because of Hiroshi Abe.  Up to this movie, I had yet to see him in any drama or movie that was disappointing.  This movie still proves that.  I had read the synopsis of the movie before I got it but by the time I actually sat down to watch it, I'd already forgotten the plot.

Hiroshi Abe is Ryo.  He recently married Yukari, a widow with a 10 year old son, Atsushi.  When the movie starts, they are on their way to Ryo's parent's home.  Ryo has a sister who is already at the parent's home with her husband and their 2 kids.  Dear God...when I heard her voice I was so close to stopping the movie.  She has the most annoying voice I have ever heard.  I don't know if she did it on purpose or if that's the way she speaks...either way, I couldn't stand it.

The movie is basically about how the family comes together to remember Ryo's older brother, Junpei who 15 years prior, saved the life of a 10 year old boy and lost his own life as a result.  The movie doesn't say exactly how he died though I suspect perhaps he may have drowned.  That detail isn't important anyway...

It seems that Junpei was supposed to follow in his father's footsteps and become a doctor so he could take over the clinic that his father was running.  Ryo's relationship with his father is strained and it seems it's because without Junpei, everything the father had hoped for was gone.  Ryo could never be Junpei...

The movie turned out to be pretty good despite that annoying actress' voice.  Hiroshi Abe knows how to pick his roles.  I've found a few more with him in them and I'm hoping I can get a hold of them all.  I'd watch this one again.

Kimi ni Todoke

"Kimi ni Todoke" is originally a manga series (still being printed) that gave life to 2 anime versions.  What I'm watching is, of course, the movie version with Haruma Miura ("Bloody Monday") where he plays the role of Shota Kazehaya, the most popular boy in school.

The lead girl is Sawako Kuronuma (played by some girl I've never seen before). Sawako is actually a nice girl who just wants to be helpful to everyone but since she wears her hair like the girl from the Japanese horror flick "Ringu" ("The Ring") the other kids call her "Sadako".  There are rumors going around about her and some powers she allegedly possesses.  The other students are afraid of her because of this.

Kazehaya is on his way to school one day when Sawako sees he may be lost and guides him the right way to the school.  He gets closer to her to thank her as a breeze blows and you see the sakura leaves falling around them.  Kazehaya smiles and reaches for her hair to pull a leaf out and hands it to Sawako and he comments about what an odd shape it is.  He walks away.  You see the leaf is in the shape of a heart.   They become friends afterwards.

Again, I won't say more cuz I'll give more away.  I took the time to get some Haruma screenshots :) since I can't get enough of him.

Parade

Took me a few days to finish watching this one.  I kept getting detoured to do something else so I scheduled a night where I put everything away so I could finish it.

"Parade" is a 2LDK (2 bedrooms, Living/Dining room, & Kitchen) that belongs to Naoki Ihara, played by Tatsuya Fujiwara.  His name didn't ring a bell but his face sure did.  I had to look him up to find he was Light Yagami from the live action "Death Note" movies.  He was also in "Battle Royale" and "Battle Royale 2".  I saw "Battle Royale" but I honestly wasn't paying much attention to it.  My daughter had seen it and said it was good and unfortunately, I agreed to watch it one night and I ended up falling asleep on and off so I may as well not have seen it at all.  I remember absolutely nothing about it.  Guess I'll have to watch it again. Tatsuya is also from the movie "Kaiji, The Ultimate Gambler".  There are 2 of those movies but I've only seen the first one.

So, the 2LDK is actually rented by Naoki but there are 3 others that live there when the movie starts and eventually they end up with 1 more.  By all appearances, Naoki seems like the only one that is all together.  He has a job working for a film distribution company.  The original 3 each have their issues.

Kotomi is an out of work actress that is dating a J-drama actor.  She sees him when his schedule allows and she seems to be content with that.  Mirai is an illustrator who drinks and smokes a lot.  There's something about her past that she's been holding onto by way of a VHS tape that oddly soothes her when she watches it even though it was something that scared her when she witnessed  it live when she was young.

At some point in the movie, a guy wakes up in their house.  Each roommate is pleasant with Satoru and they all assume that someone else has brought him into the apartment.  Satoru turns out to be a male prostitute that hangs out in a local park waiting to be picked up by men.

A sub-story is happening while we watch these people go about their lives.  There have been a few attacks on women not far from their apartment, that have been publicized on television.  Mirai begins to suspect Satoru since the attacks started more or less when Satoru wandered into their apartment.

That's all I'll say.  At first the movie seemed pretty pointless to me.  There didn't seem to be a plot and it felt like the "story" was going nowhere.  I kept watching because I figured sooner or later it would get better.  The characters grew on me though so watching the rest was bearable.  By the end of the movie, I was sad to see it end.

Overall a good movie.  I'd watch it again.

Love and Honor

Wow.  Of the three movies, this was my favorite.  Yeah, the fact that Takuya Kimura is in it does help; but not by much.  It wasn't exactly the same as the first two movies. There were similarities but the first two were more alike than the third one was to either of them. The more dramas and movies I watch with Takuya in them, the more I can see he's almost as good as Hiroshi Abe.

In "Love and Honor", Takuya is a low level (30 koku) samurai named Shinnojo Mimura.  He's married to Kayo, his loyal and faithful wife.  Shinnojo works as a food sampler for his lordship.  He and about 4 other samurai have the risky task of tasting the lord's food for poison before it is served to the lord.  Takuya has grown tired of his job and he tells Kayo he wants to quit his job at the castle and open a dojo and teach sword fighting to children of all castes.  

One day at work, the samurais taste some Red Tsubugai shellfish.  For about a minute of two, everyone appears to be fine so the cooks are told to go ahead and serve the lord.  While the food is being taken and served to the lord, the samurais start to get up.  Shinnojo begins to cough and gag and eventually keels over.  The servants on their way to the lord are told to not serve the food because it has been poisoned.  The lord is spared but Shinnojo falls ill.  An internal investigation reveals that the Red Tsubaugai was not poisoned; it had turned toxic because it was out of season.

Shinnojo lay sick for a few days before he woke up and quickly realized that he could not see.  The doctor told him to keep taking the medicine he had prescribed and that things would get better.  On his way out, the doctor tells Kayo he will never see again.  Kayo decides to keep this info to herself.

While Kayo is out, Shinnojo asks his servant for the truth about his eyes and the servant tells him everything.  When Kayo comes back, they argue.  If he is to be blind for the rest of his life, how is he supposed to provide for himself and his wife?  A blind samurai?  He's convinced that he will lose his status.

The rest of the family, including Kayo, get together to figure out how they can help Shinnojo.  Suggestions are made but all are shot down.  Then Uncle says he no longer has any high ranking friends at the castle and asks if anyone knows someone who is high ranked and can help them out.  Kayo tells Uncle she knows a high ranking samurai and that he had offered to help if she asked.  Uncle tells Kayo to go and ask him to use his influence to get the lord to help.  Kayo agrees to ask.

Uncle shows up one day to tel Shinnojo that the lord has decided to let him keep his 30 koku status and that because of his service, he is to be taken care of for life.  This is most welcome news for Shinnojo as a weight is lifted off his shoulders.  Then along comes his Auntie...a woman Shinnojo does not like very much because she talks too much and loves to gossip.  She arrives under the pretense of stopping by to see how Shinnojo is.  But she is there to inform him of something her husband had mentioned to her.  It seems her husband saw Kayo at a teahouse with a man that was not her husband.  Enraged, Shinnojo disregards respect for his elders and tells his Aunt exactly what he thinks of her and asks her to leave. 

Shinnojo asks his servant to follow Kayo and the servant does as he is told.  At first he sees nothing suspicious until he sees her walk into a teahouse.  Back at home Kayo starts to talk about what the servant saw.  The servant stops her and tells her he saw nothing and that he intends to tell the master just that; but Kayo tells the servant she will tell Shinnojo everything.

Kayo confesses to Shinnojo that she went to ask the high ranked samurai for help.  She tells him she's known him since she was a little girl and that he had asked about Shinnojo after hearing of his misfortune.  He offered her his help if she ever needed it.  She told Shinnojo that it was Uncle's idea for her to go see him.  She tells him that the samurai was understanding and told her he would do everything in his power to help.  His help however, was not free and he forced himself on Kayo.  He threatened Kayo that he would tell Shinnojo if she did not give herself to him again so he takes her again.  And then again with the same threat.  Shinnojo becomes livid when he realizes that the lord's "kindness" was because the high ranked samurai intervened on his behalf after having been with his wife.  He tells her she's not the Kayo he knows and then he calls the servant and tells him he's divoreced Kayo and tells him to help her get her things and send her away.  The servant tries to reason with Shinnojo but he won't hear it.  Kayo takes a few things and, in the rain, she goes away.

Later, he finds out that though the high ranked samurai had offered to go to the lord for Shinnojo, he never really did and that the lord's decision to help Shinnojo for life was his own.  The lord realized if Shinnojo had not fallen ill, then he may have been the one to have gotten sick or he could have died.  Learning this, Shinnojo realizes that the samurai deceived Kayo and he decides to avenge Kayo's honor.

Shinnojo sends the servant to the samurai's home with a message to meet with him and not to underestimate him because he is blind.  

I'll only say now that Shinnojo and the samurai meet for a sword fight.  Shinnojo is prepared to die for his family's honor...how will he do as a blind samurai fighting perhaps the best fighting samurai he knows?

I wasn't planning on writing a summary for this movie; but I couldn't help myself once I started.  I was only going to say a few words about it and well...I got carried away.  I also wasn't planning on putting any screenshots in here but...I'll make an exception this time because they're both of Takuya...he's so amazingly hot.  Well, not so much as a samurai but in the dramas. 

The Hidden Blade

I thought these movies were going to be related in some way; but after watching the end of "The Twilight Samurai", I realized I was wrong.  Each movie is pretty much its own movie.  The only thing in common is that they're all about samurais.  I just watched a few minutes of "The Hidden Blade" and it seems to be along the same lines as "The Twilight Samurai".  It's "light"...by light I mean it's not heavy full of battling samurais and it's not full of just drama.  There are a few moments that are..."chuckleable".

"The Twilight Samurai" was a great movie and I'd certainly watch it again.  So far "The Hidden Blade" is good (keep in mind I only saw a few minutes of it).  There's still a chance too, that the last movie might be related to this movie.  I don't think it is but you never know.

Yoji Yamada's Samurai Trilogy

So, while I was looking for a new movie to watch, I found one with Kimura Takuya in it.  It was a great find after watching "I Come With the Rain" since I was planning on looking up what other films he had done.  After I acquired the film "Love and Honor" I found out it is the third movie of a Samurai Trilogy by director, Yoji Yamada.  Of course I had to look up the first two (thinking Kimura would be in all of them) and I started to watch it.

At first I thought it was going to be one of those usual samurai movies that I can never really get into (sorry, Akira Kurosawa).  But this one was different.  It's set in mid 19th century Japan and tells the story of a low ranking samurai named Seibei Iguchi.  I've watched about an hour of it so far and I think it's great.  It's a light movie with a few parts that make u laugh a little.  I can't wait to watch the rest and eventually the other two.

That being said, "Parade" will have to wait.

New Update

I just finished watching 2 more movies so I think it's time to go ahead and revive this blog.  In the next few days I will be moving things around here and starting to watch new movies in between dramas.  In about a week or two, I should be done fixing this blog and will start to post once or twice a week depending on how many movies I can fit it between work and my Facebook games :P

WILL BE BACK SOON

Catching up on my J-Dramas but I will be back here with a new improved and updated J-Movie blog :D

2LDK

I started to watch this soon after I got it.  The Summary I read about said it was funny but I found it to be a bit slow in the beginning.

One girl, Maho Nonami, to the left in the pic was pretty unattractive and her roommate, Eiko Koike was better looking but not by much mind you...I kept watching out of curiosity since I wasn't ready to watch the whole thing right then and there.  I wasn't much impressed with it; but I'd gone thru the trouble of getting it so I may as well watch the movie.  Worst case, I would fall asleep and get a nap out of it.

When I finally sat down to watch the whole thing, I thought it was good.  It wasn't "HAHAHA" funny but it had its moments.  The fight scenes were funny...I'll give it that.  The ending, also funny in a sad way.

Eiko Koike and Maho Nonami are Nozomi and Rana (no surnames in the movie).  They're aspiring actresses and roommates.  When the movie starts, we find out that both girls had just auditioned for the same part in a new film "Yakuza Wives".  While they wait for the phone call to find out if either one gets the part, they start to fight about stupid little things and you realize that they really hate each other.  The funny parts were mostly when they were fighting, though in the beginning, when they're talking to each other, the sarcastic remarks are hilarious.

I didn't expect the final showdown to go down the way it did...despite my inital thought that it was somewhat slow and boring in the beginning...once Rana arrives home, that's when the fun started.

g@me

The two major characters in this story are Sakuma Shunsuke (played by Naohito Fujiki) and Katsuragi Chiharu (played by Yukie Nakama).  The only reason I watched this movie was for Naohito Fujiki.  I'd seen him in a drama (or two) and I thought he was so good looking...I had to watch more of him.

Naohito Fujiki is Sakuma, an ad executive who is slightly upset that his idea gets the heave ho when the CEO of his company (Mikado Beer), Mr. Katsuragi, decides to take the companys ad in "a different direction".  Sakuma later comes up with a different idea only to find out he's been taken off the project completely.  With his pride hurt, he hands around Mr. Katsuragi's home trying to figure out a way to get back at him and he happens to run into Katsuragi Juri running away from home.  Sakuma sees an opportunity and follows Katsuragi's daughter to a motel where she attempts to get a room but is told nothing is available.  She makes for the public phones nearby looking to call another place when Sakuma tells her she won't find anything available at that time of night.  She tries to run away from the stranger but he calls her by name and she stops running.  Sakuma, with his pride hurt, and Juri, with her own bone to pick with her father, both decide to fake Juri's kidnapping in order to get a big payday.  With Sakuma's intelligence, everything seems to be going according to plan.  They get the money, and he lets Juri go. 

Things change a few days later when Sakuma hears on the news that the body of Katsuragi Juri is found...that's when the whole movie takes a different twist.  After Sakuma hears about the discovery of Juri's body, the story again takes another twist.  There were a few times I thought one thing was going to happen only to find out I was way off.  I've never been one to find deep meanings in movies...I just like to watch without thinking.  Even though most of these movies (and more so with dramas) seem to be somewhat predictable, there are times when they take a different route.  I would definitely watch this movie again (and again).

One thing that terribly disappointed me about Fujiki.  He's so good looking but  OMG...the man cannot kiss.  There was a scene where he kisses Juri and it looked awful.  Looked sloppy...almost as if it was the first time he'd ever done it.  I sat there and watched in horror...I don't know if it was on purpose or if that's the way ahe kisses.  It was just bad.  But I'd still watch the movie again!