My Sweet Grappa Remedies

Film description

Yoshiko likes the simple things in life – she rides her bike, goes shopping, and observes the world around her. She works in a corporation, and in the evenings she likes to sit and sip Italian grappa. But Yoshiko begins to notice a sort of emptiness in her routine. She is single and forty – Japanese society views her as a loner who doesn’t contribute to the collective social organism. But her isolation will be broken by a friend and a relationship with a much younger work colleague.

A distinctive feature of Akiko Ohku’s work is her fondness for the world of office ladies, women employed in huge corporations as semi-glorified paper pushers. The director depicts the oppressive, patriarchal dynamics of the Japanese society in a subtle way. In the foreground of My Sweet Grappa Remedies is the energy of sisterhood – Ohku’s protagonists are usually women in their 30s who choose their own path in spite of society’s pressure to give up work and start a family. They show us their foibles, their bizarre habits and their choices, which often defy rigid social expectations. The result is a rich and colorful depiction of their everyday lives. Ohku’s movies are full of a unique kind of cringe and boundless eccentricity, but also deep empathy, especially striking against the background of corporate coldness. In interviews, Ohku says this is her way of drawing self-portraits; through her protagonists’ neurotic behaviors, she underscores her independence in the world and the movie industry. She achieves something incredibly rare in Japanese cinema – a balance between breezy narration, in-depth scrutiny and feminist engagement.

text:
Łukasz Mańkowski