How to paint God without thinking of religion.....
The only reason I'm writing this really is because I found out that the woman who plays Toko is not an actor but an artist. She wrote the manga this movie is based on, the screenplay for it, and played the character of an artist in the film. She was superb in Strawberry Shortcakes and I would not have guessed she was not an actor. I went online to see what else she had done and found that she had not been in anything else. ...I don't know what to do with this information. She was so good.
Nananan Kiriko - Toko
Nakamura Yuko - Akiko
Ikewaki Chizuru - Satoko
Nakagoshi Noriko - Chihiro
Ando Masanobu - Kikuchi
Kase Ryo - Nagai
My favourite scenes were when Akiko was with Kikuchi. Such natural banter and, well I think she just looks so beautiful.
The plot is a hard one to really explain as there isn't much of it.
I don't want to go into too much detail, but it is a bittersweet feeling movie about four women who's lives have little direction and love seems to evade them no matter how they try to welcome it.
Each of the characters has their own story but all four are woven in between each other pretty seemlessly.
Toko is an artist struggling with bulimia, living with Chihiro - a girl who seems to be a push over at work and in relationships.
Akiko is a prostitute in love with a long term friend Kikuchi - both of them get together to drink and talk of how everyone from their schools are succeeding but them.
Satoko works at the reception desk of Akiko's escort agency, hoping to be in love someday but never seeming to find it. She supports Akiko in her difficult life as best she can from afar.
That is pretty much it in a nutshell. It is one of those quiet movies that plods along nicely with some sweet moments and some horrible ones too. It has no real conclusion, because it is just a snap shot into their lives at one moment, but done not feel entirely pointless, just a little reflective and melancholy.
Im going to start making these reviews a bit shorter like this one I think otherwise I never have time to post them. Hopefully this means I can continue to post more than once in a blue moon. Let's see if I can keep my epic ranting to a minimum shall we?
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