Shomuni film -- help

Mark Schilling schill
Sat Apr 22 03:07:13 EDT 2000


In response to Steven's query about Shomuni, here's my Japan Times review,
as condensed for my book, Contemporary Japanese Film.

Mark Schilling

Shomuni (12/15/98)

Produced by Shochiku; screenplay by Nobuyuki Isshiki; directed by Takayoshi
Watanabe; With: Reiko Takashima, Kumiko Endo, Michiko Kawai, Asako
Kobayashi, Mari Hamada, Ben Sato. Running time: 98 mins.

Hiroyuki Yasuda's *Shomuni,** which debuted in "Shukan Morning" in 1995,
might be described as a manga about an OL's nightmares. Set in the
high-rise tower of Manpan Shoji, a giant trading company, the manga
features OLs who have been exiled to Shomu Nika (General Affairs Section
Two), or Shomuni, a dumping ground for corporate rejects housed in a
basement Dantean hell. 
	But though the OLs of Shomuni may spend their days screwing in fluorescent
bulbs and trundling mail carts, they are any but corporate slaveys. Exiled
for various misdeeds, they are content to coast, while indulging their
various interests, eccentricities and appetites to the limit.  And their
wussy kacho (section chief)? They all but ignore his existence.
	This manga about office flowers turned boss-defying weeds struck a chord
in an age of restructuring and downsizing: *Shomuni** became a hit and
generated a Fuji TV series that scored high ratings. Now Shochiku has
released *Shomuni** the movie, scripted by Nobuyuki Isshiki and directed by
Takayoshi Watanabe.
	Both the manga and TV show may have strained credibility in the pursuit of
laughs, but they offered acerbic insights into the
realities of corporate life, both before and after five. The movie, though,
is a full-bore fantasy that bears about much relation to real-world office
work as *Doctor Dolittle** does to real-world veterinary practice. Also,
Isshiki and Watanabe's brand of frantic knock-about comedy is more
exhausting than amusing. At the screening I attended one patron laughed
loudly for the first five minutes, fell silent for the next thirty and
finally walked out. I wanted to follow him down the aisle. 
	The film centers on the relationship between the leggy, cynical Chinatsu
(Reiko Takashima), whose uppitiness with her male bosses landed her in
Shomuni, and the shy, naive Sawako (Kumiko Endo), who possesses the
survival skills as a duckling in a shark tank. The story follows Sawako's
first 24 hours as a Shomuni denizen,  focusing on her journey to the end of
the Tokyo night. It is less an OL comedy than the story of a young woman's
sentimental education, refracted through a sensibility that equates
grotesquerie with fun. 
	It begins with Sawako being dumped by her chubby
boyfriend for being "too boring." Soon after she is assigned to Shomuni as
a temporary helper to replace an OL who has fallen ill. Picking her way
past tangles of pipes and blasts of steam, Sawako arrives at her new
workplace -- a murky den that looks as though it has been transported from
the set of "Blade Runner." 
	Among her new colleagues are a sloe-eyed temptress (Michiko Kawai) sent
down for wrecking the homes and careers of several of her male superiors, a
bespectacled nerd (Asako Kobayashi) who is studying scriptwriting and a
loud-mouthed clown (Mari Hamada) whose reputation for truthfulness is not
the best (even her Kansai dialect is phony). By far the most formidable,
however, is Chinatsu, who dominates with her sexual swagger and intimidates
with her fearsome tongue. 
	Sawako feels the lash when Chinatsu uncovers her  lack of
experience with the male sex. But though Chinatsu and her new colleagues
may make her feel like a total loser, Sawako is drawn to them; they are not
only fellow outsiders, but have something to teach her. That evening, after
celebrating her twenty-second birthday alone in a karaoke box and having a
brief encounter with a handsome mural painter, she finds herself walking
into Chinatsu's apartment and the start of what looks to be an orgy with
two strange men. 
	Sawako escapes with her virtue intact, but soon she and Chinatsu are
rocketing through the Tokyo streets in a kindergarten bus, with a taciturn
but accommodating driver at the wheel. They have adventures, each more
incredible than the last, including the discovery of the company president
(Ben Sato) in the temptress's bed, encased in ropes. The old reprobate,
wouldn't you know it, is into S & M. Sawako also re-encounters her painter
but learns, by the end of the evening, that he is as genuine as the palm
trees he supposedly daubs. So much for romance. By the morning, her eyes
opened at last, she is ready to rejoin her sisters in disillusion and
defiance. 
	Their big idea of rebellion, however, is to putter about the corridors on
motorized chairs, while grinning into the shocked faces of their corporate
betters. A fittingly ridiculous symbol for this overstrained attempt at
recession-era comedy. Read the manga, rent the video, but give the movie
a miss. 




----------
> From: Steven Spinali <spinali at postmark.net>
> To: kinejapan at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu
> Subject: Shomuni film -- help
> Date: Saturday, April 22, 2000 2:44 PM
> 
> It was only after seeing the SHOMUNI serial on TV that I became aware
> of something -- that Shochiku had released a film with the same name
> (and theme) at about the same time.
> 
> My questions: Can anyone provide information on the film (reviews,
> whether it's good, its availability, its relation cast and plot-wise)
> on the serial?  
> 
> Thanks in advance for your help.




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