Monday, December 10, 2007

"Tokyo Tower"


Another Jun Matsumoto movie done in 2004 with Junichi Okada, Hitomi Kuroki and Shinobu Terajima. The story revolves around two college boys—Toru (Okada) and Koji (Matsumoto) who go for older women almost double their age. Toru fell in love with a socialite housewife, Shifumi (Kuroki) while Koji became involved with a plain housewife, Kimiko (Terajima).

The “May-December” affair as a theme is interesting but I find this one dragging. The scenes were devoid of excitement and the characters lacked the “fire.”

For me, Okada did not fit the role of a college student ‘coz he looks matured and his acting was so-so to think he’s the lead. Meanwhile, her partner, Kuroki, really looked class but her acting was also raw.

In fairness to Matsumoto, though he was too lean that time, his playboy character suited well with his looks and his acting was better off than Okada. Same with the character "Yoshida" who was also effective in her role as the other girl who got attracted to him. You can see in her the picture of a scorned woman. As to Terajima, her face was expressionless most of the time yet her character was a bit wild (what an irony). And like Okada and Kuroki, her interaction with Matsumoto lacked in passion thinking it’s an illicit love affair.

I guess, the title “Tokyo Tower” is not suited for the movie since the tower didn’t have any significance on the story. Yeah, Toru and Shifumi met when the tower was lit up and it also served as background when he decided to leave her but other than these, the tower was not anymore highlighted.

Therefore, if you don’t want to be pissed off, don’t watch this crappy movie.

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