Wandering Ginza Butterfly

Plot: Three years after being sent to jail for murdering a yakuza boss, humbled female gang leader Nami (Meiko Kaji) is forced to start over, returning to live with her uncle and taking a job as a hostess at a ritzy Ginza club. But when a rival gang tries to muscle in, Nami takes action.

Thoughts: For those who are already familiar with 70s Japan cinema, this offers little new. The cinematography is enjoyable, the colors crisp, and the story confusing at worst, boring at best. Little attention is paid to constructing a flowing and comprehensive narrative – characters bounce around subplots with little justification for their actions. This would be fine since the apparent point of the film is to look cool, but looking cool gets old without characters actually doing anything to be cool. There’s surprisingly little action.

Japan’s endless fascination with “American cool” is on display. Characters wear leather jackets and dark sunglasses, smart talk their way out of dangerous situations, and basically show little respect for Japanese society’s norms. Whereas French New Wave coopted the American cool of noir era film (i.e. Bogart) and then deconstructed it, Japanese cinema took the surface of American cool of rebel era film (i.e. James Dean) and, well, kept it surface. There’s no reason why characters act how they do – some are too cool for school, some are fuddy duddys, and that’s just the way it is.

Frustratingly, the most intriguing subplot of the film, the Yakuza boss’s widow who petitioned for a reduction in Nami’s sentence, is barely touched on. How accepting of life’s twists and turns must a person be to argue for a reduced punishment for the person who killed your husband and sent you back to a menial hostess life, especially when your sickness prevents you from working. Frankly, the widow makes a much more captivating character than Nami. Unfortunately she doesn’t look as cool wielding a samurai sword, and here we are.

Should you watch it? No.

Trailer: