Our little sister

Sibling love wins out

over estranged parents and

inheritance rights.

 

At the risk of developing Kore-eda fatigue, I watched yet another of his films a few days after watching After the Storm, by (again) downloading it for rental.  The film was Our little Sister (Umimachi diary in Japanese, adapted from a manga series, unusual I would think for Kore Eda, no?). It earned the Palme d’Or at Cannes back in 2015.  I had been meaning to watch it for a long while.  It was worth the wait.

It’s a really nice story of three sisters in their twenties who welcome their teenage half-sister into their home in their close-knit seaside community after meeting her for the first time at their estranged father’s funeral (to which they only reluctantly go).    The father, who had left them as children for another woman (the teenager Suzu’s mother), had moved onto wife number three who Suzu does not mind moving away from (and who doesn’t make all that good an impression on the sisters at the funeral).

Even considering their issues with both their late father who left them and their (by this time also estranged) mother to go off with another woman (and going on to have a daughter, Suzu, with her), their own personality clashes (nothing too severe though), and their relationship with their estranged mother, the three women are very good to each other and kind to the new teenager in their lives and it all goes very smoothly, with her settling in with ease.  Being a teenager in a new environment can be very hard, having to make new friends and fit in but she does so very easily.

Another of the film’s characters, the popular café owner has a less happy (family) ending when her long-lost estranged brother comes back into her life to claim inheritance their parents had left. Her failing health precipitates her decision to close up shop, with the help of the bank (where one of the sisters, Yoshiko, works) enabling her to give him what he is due from the proceeds of the sale.

Inheritance issues often cause trouble in families but in this case, there is the added problem of causing extra stress to the woman who has found out she has cancer.  However, the brother may have got his hands on the inheritance but as Yoshiko’s colleague (played by Ryo Kase) points out, if she made a will she would be able to control what would happen the rest of her assets, and of course ensure that her funeral would be paid for as ‘that type of brother would probably not care about that side of things’ to paraphrase him.  Yoshiko makes it sound like a will is not that common in Japan for a single person.  Maybe it isn’t.  This single woman had reached her 50s (I’m guessing she’s in that age range anyway) without doing so and seems to have had no kids to pass her business or other assets onto.

From the sounds of it, the brother would automatically have gotten his hands on this single woman’s assets on her death as her only living sibling, in addition to the share of the inheritance he managed to obtain.  Which is similar to the situation here, where if you’re single with no children and you die before your parents and siblings, without making a will, your assets go first to your parents and if your parents have already died by the time you die, they are divided between any living siblings.   Many people may be estranged from their siblings or parents for good reason and might prefer to bequeath their belongings to friends or charities/good causes or both.  People think making a will too early is also just too morbid for their liking.  It’s natural. No one wants to think of death while they’re still busy living life.  Those who might care might happen to like and love the people their assets will go to automatically so don’t do it for that reason.

Still, if the worst happens and you do care what happens your stuff, it doesn’t hurt to make sure it will go to someone you love or at least like (having a good friend or other relative you actually like to execute the will is obviously necessary as well).   A lot of life is anti-singleton enough as it is so why should it be the same after you die?

The woman in Our Little Sister while appearing to have a fairly good life with her own popular eatery, seemingly a love interest, and a warm, caring community around her, still had no one to bequeath her belongings to (bar the love interest maybe).  It just shows that you simply cannot tell what kind of situation a person is really in.

So, enough about wills (important as they are) and death. I hope you’re still with me.

Our little sister has a real warm view of a lovely family accepting a newbie (and dealing with their issues in a very honest way) while it is also in a small way something of a foodie film which is an extra bonus.   Food is almost another character in this film between the girls’ cooking skills and plum wine-making tradition playing a part in welcoming the young teenager into the family, the local fishing industry’s contribution to their dishes, and the older woman’s popular cafe.

Comparing it to After the Storm, both films have family difficulties in common and the characters show great integrity in both films in facing their problems. I’d prefer the siblings in Our Little Sister though, compared to Ryota’s one sibling in After the Storm.  Getting on her moral high horse when she behaves in no different a way to Ryota really annoyed me.  I also feel more for Ryota whose struggle to succeed in the writing career he really wants (after having initial success) is frowned upon by family, mostly the sister, who thinks he’s doing nothing.

A look at the cast:  The eldest sister of the three in their 20s, is played by Haruka Ayase, the main character in Ichi (in my film list).  The middle sister is played by  Masami Nagasawa who I once saw in a drama I enjoyed called Last Friends (really strange opening credits but lovely drama).  I did not recognise the younger sister from anything I don’t think but the actress goes by the name Kaho.   The actress playing teenager Suzu was a newcomer I believe.  Lily Franky, Ryo Kase (who I have mentioned and was glad to see) and the late Kiki Kirin also appear in the film, in smaller roles.

Anyone else seen this film?   What did you think of it?

Apart from a brief look at a drama I watched lately, I expect to be talking about literature in my next post … so check in again very soon!

Ichi great film!!

Goze, Samurai –

both inept and once great – and

Bandits are all here

So I`ve been chopping and changing my film list lately as I have mentioned but I just made another change to it, restoring Ichi to its rightful place in the list i.e. in the first section, having watched it again last night.  Though there is one ex-Samurai in it, Banki, who has fallen out of favour (because of his looks) and another guy who did not quite make it to Samurai status because of his fear of drawing his sword (but was pretty handy with a wooden sword nonetheless), it`s mainly about one blind girl`s quest to find an answer to a big question in her life which brings her into the acquaintance of Toma and forces her into an encounter with Banki, who now leads a bandit gang against a yakuza family and the town they control.   She fights as well as any Samurai too having been taught to fight by her father throughout her younger years, despite being blind.   That`s why I put it in the Samurai section.

With the exception of the few heart-wrenching parts when she is a child and other certain scenes,  I forgot how  funny it is (not laugh out loud but chuckle-funny) especially hapless Toma who can`t use his real sword but amazingly gets by most of the time without having to draw it.  The soundtrack is interesting as well, by Lisa Gerrard, who sings the main theme of Gladiator (great theme and great film).   Not music I`d want to listen to too much, a bit heavy for me, but fitting for this film. I never paid attention to who it was before.    Shidou Nakamura, who plays the leader of the bandits (and once great Samurai) does my head in though.  Overacting just a tad as usual (I don`t really think he has that shibui-ness anymore either).   His righthand man in the film definitely overacts.  I don`t know who that actor is but I bet he`s in lots of gangster or samurai films.  I mentioned in a previous post about Tora! Tora! Tora!  that actors were encouraged to overact back then but maybe that is still the case or Nakamura is an actor who likes that method.

The film also shows how hard it is for women at that time.  In this case, the character was spurned and thrown out of her Goze (blind musicians) troupe (the only section of society that she could feel part of) even though she was the victim in the particular situation.    Men took advantage of her in one case, or she of them as she needed `to be warmed up at night` and women judged her for it.    I say `that time`.  A lot of women are still quite cruel to each other, whether a woman is a victim or not.