Happily Ever After Plus Linda^3 & The Girl Who Leapt Through Time

I watched my second film at Viz Cinema/New People. I enjoyed Happily Ever After (2007) much better than Battle League Horumô. Sadly, New People isn't introducing many new people to J-Pop cinema. Seven people were in the audience for Battle League Horumô and only four people (including me) saw Happily Ever After on the Tuesday night (7 PM) screening I went to.

The film isn't great by any standards. It starts off silly and veers towards melodrama but provides a nice vehicle for actress Miki Nakatani. Opposite her is the capable actor Hiroshi Abe who I recently saw in Still Walking as the put upon surviving son.

Happily Ever After centers around the long-suffering Yukie Morita. She is suffering because her loutish boyfriend doesn't work, is frequently drunk and has a tendency to flip over the dinner table at the slightest provocation. Her downstairs neighbor (Maki Carousel) counts how often the table is flipped as well as how often they have sex (table flips far outnumber coitus).

Why does Yukie put up with his behavior with a cheerful demeanor and never a complaint? The movie explains it through her backstory - Yukie's father was a convicted bank robber so she was ostracized at school. After graduation, she went to Tokyo to start anew...she started streetwalking and a heroin addiction. For some reason, gangster Isao Hayama (Abe) took a liking to her. Why? I'm not sure what he saw in a strung out whore who mocks his declarations of love but he saw something. After hallucinating that a chicken is pecking her, Yukie slits her own throat but her life is saved when Hayama rushes her to the hospital. Upon release from the hospital, Hayama and Yukie leave to start a new life. Hayama is missing his pinkie finger which is shorthand for saying he has left the Yakuza.

After some undefined period of time, that is where the film begins. Hayama doesn't know how to do anything except be a Yakuza gangster and he's bored, frustrated and resentful about his situation. Yukie tries to ease his pain by being the best wife possible (even though they aren't married). She waitresses at a restaurant to support them and makes dinner every night which he more often than not, overturns when something bothers him.

This description sounds very serious and downbeat but the film is mostly a comedy. Hayama's outbursts and behavior played for laughs and Yukie's boss fruitlessly pines for her (to the point of exclusively visiting a massage parlor to see another woman named Yukie). And of course, it has a happy ending with even an unusual bi-racial couple thrown in for good measure.

Happily Ever After is an entertaining enough film. Apparently, based on a manga series, the film may or may not have captured the spirit of the graphic novels.



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In December, New People is screening two films that I have seen and enjoyed.

From December 4 to 10, Linda Linda Linda (2005) is screening. I enjoyed the teenage comedy about an all-girl band performing at their high school's spring festival. The film featured a strong performance by Korean actress Doo-na Bae. I saw it at the 2006 SFIAAFF.

On December 15 & 16, New People screens The Girl Who Leapt Through Time (2006) - an anime whose title says it all. The film, which I saw at the 2007 SFIAAFF, was unusually poignant for an anime (which I am typically not a fan of). I can still recall the scene(s) where she is riding her bicycle down a steep hill to a fateful train crossing.

2006 Was a Very Good Year

One of the treats of going to film festivals occurs in the form of delayed gratification. I am referring to when a festival film gets wider distribution. It gives me a sense of having inside knowledge. This has occurred frequently as of late.

2006 San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival (SFIAAFF) was a cornucopia of pre-release films. The Special Jury Award went to Colma The Musical. I wanted to see that film because it was filmed near where I lived but the showings were sold out. Colma has a limited release (SF & NYC) this summer. It's in its third week at Embarcadero Cinema. I caught it a couple weekends ago and have to agree that it was deserving of an award. I recognized many of the filming locations (one shot was about 4 blocks my place). Beyond that, the tunes were catchy and the story was interesting enough. I won't go into too much detail because you can read the SF Chronicle's review. I largely agree with the review although I thought there was unrequited love between Rodel & Billy. I also thought that by making Rodel's character mean-spirited at times, it added some depth to his character. Allegedly, the creators of Colma are working on its sequel - Serramonte The Musical.

Colma The Musical 2006 SFIAAFF synopsis
Colma The Musicall - Official Website

Also from the 2006 SFIAAFF was Eve & the Fire Horse. It just opened on Friday, July 6. The Chronicle review panned it but I found the film quite endearing. Being half-Japanese, I found the scenes where Vivian Wu's character speak Chinese and her daughters respond in English to be dead on and insightful. It was a little touch that captures how I still communicate with my mother to this day. I haven't seen the film in 16 months but I recall laughing out loud. The film took place in the 70's which is time when I would have been Eve's age (9 years old). The fact that it is a period piece is not mentioned in the review but again the director/writer (Julia Kwan) got the details just right. Frequently, a film doesn't stand up to a second viewing so the criticisms may be valid but my initial response to the film was that it the film was wonderful.

Other films from the 2006 SFIAAFF that were later distributed were Kekexili: Mountain Patrol (pronounced ka-ka-zhi-lee), Journey From The Fall, and The Slanted Screen. For my money, the best film of the 2006 SFIAAFF was Linda, Linda, Linda, a Japanese comedy about four schoolgirls that form a rock band to enter their school's talent contest. In addition to the regular teenage angst, they must deal with the lead singer who is a Korean exchange student that barely speaks Japanese & can't carry a tune. By the way, the movie title is based on a song by the Blue Hearts, an 1980's punk rock group out of Japan.

From the 2007 SF IndieFest, Ten Canoes is being distributed. The film is an aboriginal tale within an aboriginal tale set in the time before time, in the Australian outback. It had its moments but I wasn't greatly impressed by the film.