Review: 14 Sai no Haha (III)

14 SAI NO HAHA

(PART THREE – I KNOW! I HAVE SO MUCH TO SAY ABOUT THIS DRAMA!)

THE ACTION

You know I think for all the drama’s lacking in the Brain Department, it really does make up for it with a whole lot of Soul and Heart. The acting’s…brilliant – and I think, from all the overwhelming praise on Youtube – most people think that too. You have people just gushing, gushing, gushing about this actor or that actress and on my part, I suppose the acting must have been stellar for me to decide to have to put up with all that offensively stupid decisions.

[1] Of course, there is Shida Mirai as protagonist, Miki Ichinose. And I loved Shida Mirai in Jyoou no Kyoushitsu (The Queen’s Classroom) which was absolutely bril (!!!) and I hope one day I can churn out a review that does it most justice. So we all know she has some calibre and she was good in the drama – especially in the first episode and when she first has her labour troubles. I actually Youtubed videos of real women really having labour contractions and stuff and…Shida Mirai’s gooooood! Shida Mirai is the real deal! I just didn’t think the bulk of the show/script did her acting much justice – mostly, she just had to look determined and sincere. Which I mean…she did fantastically but…most of her scenes, however well acted, just isn’t award-winning material.

(This is Shida Mirai being exhausted and numbed with shock and grief. As you can see, she looks very…blank and numb. Which is good! Which is…you know, intended. But would you give her an award for this woody expression? I think not. How sad. She does numb with grief very well.)

(This is Shida Mirai being determined to say something to her boyfriend. Whoa, we CAN see the strength in her eyes. But again…hmm)

[2] And then of course there was Tanaka Misako as Ichinose Kanako!

Who I thought was anabsolute gem – she’s carries herself with the sort of quiet dignity and cultivated poise on which Westerners base an entire culture of fetishising the Orient. She is, you will find, the archetypal Asian Beauty – submissive and mindful of all the anachronistic rules and sense of decorum but with an underlying strength and enough independence of mind to influence her husband in the gentle, polite way she went about doing that. (Yes yes, I won’t stop waxing lyrical and am clearly sold to her cause!)

…And it helps that she is naturally, quite the beauty. I honestly don’t know how much of it can be attributed to the calibre of her acting but surely, credit must be given for the kind of respect she commands as powerfully as she is gentle. I’ve heard of people following the series only because they admire Tanaka Misako’s mama Ichinose. I’m not sure I’d stick to a series for a side character? But her acting definitely helped ground several scenes integral to the development of the plot so that the drama wasn’t as flawed in execution as in concept.

(Tanaka Misako’s quality of “Yasashii” captured in one of my favourite, most poignant scenes)

[3] Another superstar would be Miki Ichinose’s heartmeltingly adorable lil bro – Koshimizu Kazuki’s Kenta Ichinose

Seriously, how cute is he? But don’t be fooled! This child actor didn’t cruise by banking solely on his natural Kawaii.

(From heart-melting to heart-breaking: One of the saddest saddest scenes masterfully pulled off…you know, it sounds wrong even to say that because in that heart-wrenching moment, it really didn’t even seem like he was acting. You can’t fake that little tremor in the lip, that profound sadness in the eyes and that desperate, broken voice!!! Give him an Emmy already! )

The rest of the cast were good but if I commented on them all, I’d run into my fourth post on 14 Sai no Haha and as it is, I have no idea why this review is running on for so long. I would point out, however, that Miura Haruma as Miki’s boyfriend, Kirino Satoshi and Namase Katsuhisa as her father, Tadahiko Ichinose were rather underwhelming/disappointing though.  Miura Hiruma, I think, was partially let down himself by a script which left him rather…vague and ill-defined. Namase Katsuhisa on the other hand, was just…wrongly cast?! I mean, we know him as that wacky-ass head-master guy in Gokusen right? And he is not such a Johnny Depp that he can play such differing roles with the much needed versatility. He actually managed to look comical in all his overacting – which, of course, rather ruined some supposedly really sad scenes…but I don’t know, you be the judge.

IN CONCLUSION

In short, I think this was one of the most brilliant dramas (technicality-wise) I have ever watched. The acting deserves the kind of mad, raving praises you see all over Youtube and while I didn’t cry myself, I can see why male members of the audience admit publicly to sobbing over some of the scenes. The only thing that sort of…niggled at me was probably the overused Sad Music – it wasn’t even inappropriately used. It was, as some put it, beautiful – just…at some point, you get bored of things – beautiful Sad Music included. But I cannot get over its being opposed to almost every value and belief I hold dear. (It’s not that I’m dogmatic of bigoted – I’d like to think its just common sense raging up in fury at the drama’s brutal violation of all things common sense-ical) And I would definitely put up some disclaimer here to say that…I have been supremely biased in judging this drama and I will likely continue to be but I also think my biases as well-founded and logically justified, so. Maybe that’s good enough reason for you to catch the drama? It is a well-executed film and I’d wager, one of the more convincing and realistic ones we will see in a long time. There are few better dramas with which to truly challenge your worldview and rouse the culture skeptic in you.

Or if you aren’t feeling soooo intellectual – there’s Miura Haruma!

Review: 14 Sai no Haha (II)

14 SAI NO HAHA

THE PLOT (Continued)

Right. So Miki Ichinose makes a series of Very Bad Decisions because, presumably, this bullish constancy is supposed to demonstrate some kind of inner strength. It unfortunately means she repeatedly turns down her Hot Form Teachers’ efforts to get her back to school.This is another reason why I cannot bring myself to condone her fourteen-year-old pregnancy (though of course, I am open-minded enough not be principally opposed to all 14 year old pregnancies… I mean, you’d never know if the 2 lone survivors of some terrible global catastrophe turned out to be hapless 14 year olds. And how could anybody condemn the noble task of repopulating the earth?). But after her first bad decision to actually have the baby, she decides she doesn’t want to return to school even after giving birth. Because…she’s decided she’ll just attend night school when the baby grows up and she’s an adult. Of course, her longer-term plan is to become  a doctor so she can get that steady income to support her family – so night school’s going to fit perfectly in to the Long Term. Everybody knows how Night School is the quickest route to a medical degree.

You do not TURN DOWN YAMAGUCHI SAYAKA! She’s too…hot! And awesome! And turning down said form teacher AFTER she’s gone the extra mile, persuading a bunch of stodgy old farts to accept Miki again is…well, plain immoral. ALSO, Miki dearie, your mother went and bowed in front of said old farts to accept you back as well.

…Humiliating? Well, it’s not that bad…compared to when she had to write back to the school and say she, a grown adult, begged for absolutely nothing in the end because it turns out her daugther was more ambitious than oh you know, just the most expensive private high-school education you can get at the sacrifice of both your parents. It is just awful the drama frames her decision as another “milestone moment”, another indicator of how much more Miki has “matured” along the way. Yay for Heroine Miki, the Awesome Moresome 14-Year-Old Mother!

And AFTER the bad decision of her not wanting to abort (which we can look past only because…we have to clear that obstacle before we can have a whole series about 14-year-old mothers). And AFTER the bad decision of her choosing not to return to the Ideal Education Institution she was privileged with from the start…she decides on behalf of her unborn child and her whole family, that she will sever all ties with the baby’s father. Of course, that is the noble, self-sacrificing, Mother Theresa option and that is why she chooses it – what could be more…self-sacrificial than offering up your offspring’s choice to see or not see his/her father?

Break from Sucking.

Is when it concentrates on the physical difficults of being pregnant and 14 – its not so much that it is fun watching Miki suffer or anything (as I might or might not have accidentally suggested earlier). It’s just… one takes a break from all her stupidity being at the forefront of things. Yes, she made stupid decisions but at this phase of the drama (which sadly, comes late late into the series), her pregnancy has become nothing but a Fact. And one concentrates instead on the intense labour pains and stuff – which you know, are scenes really well executed. But more about that later.

Back to Sucking.

When Miki…is well enough to talk, she says she wants to marry her boyfriend. And her boyfriend makes the decision to quit school as well so that he can get a job and help Miki out with his minimum wages. Okay, he doesn’t say minimum wages but the Japanese economy is contracting at about 5% yearly and we all know what sort of executive jobs one can get with a high school diploma or…heck, its not even called a diploma because its just a graduation certificate.

…WHAT  DOES EVERYBODY HAVE AGAINST EDUCATION?! Ima Big Fan of Education – hear it lifts entire communities out of poverty. Also, mummy always told me its a good idea not to drop out as soon as possible. It’s all about delayed gratification. So you forfeit the five-bucks-an-hour you could be making at a your local burger I’m sorry, sushi joint and you go to school instead. School fees, yucky tests and horrible uniforms that come with horrific caps. You DO stand to gain a chance to get an actual degree after a couple of years that’ll get you a proper job and maybe like, 1000 dollars per month if you’re less lucky than most.Y’ know? Y’know?! Guess you wouldn’t…since you quit school for your baby. Who, I’m sure, will be absolutely stoked to know his parents didn’t go to school.

(Disclaimer: I don’t have anything against the uneducated. I hate it when people voluntarily pass up their chance at education to go and do stupid, immature things like raising babies with minimum wages. And I have convinced you that that will happen right?)

Break from Sucking Again.

Anyway, Miki’s family is all happy and stuff when she successfully births the baby. And there’s a happy soundtrack to go with it! And they’re all in familial bliss, of course. (Like I said, the show celebrates her lunacy) And then in the last ten seconds or so, happy music suddenly stops. Dun dunnn…!

…Yeah. Noooot much of a redemption but at this point, I was so fed up with Miki’s Stupid Decisions – I wasn’t going to compain. The only reminder, the only dose of a little bit of reality. Sure, its not overtly ominous – its not like some tragic Beethoven piece starts playing or something – but it does remind people that as Wise Gynaecologist said, its all about Raising the Child. A very nice touch to even out the entire drama, I thought. One of those precious, rare cliffhanger ending’s that are also Highly -perhaps, Most– Appropriate for the scenario.

Review: 14 Sai no Haha (I)

14 SAI NO HAHA

THE PLOT

The premise is a winner – a fourteen year-old girl gets pregnant with her boyfriend’s child and after struggling with the fact that she is pregnant, decides she will keep the baby and raise it herself. Certainly, it caught my attention – surely one must have some curiosity about what it must be like being pregnant and going into labour and stuff when one is barely, barely “post-pubescent”. Much less about what mad urge must propel a fourteen year old to actually keep the baby. (Honestly, I wasn’t wondering so much about that because I assumed it must have been some jingoistic campaign against abortion that did it. BUT! It is a valid…wonderment I would have entertained if I weren’t so jaded about how the world must always be anti-abortion and how this drama therefore had to be you know, “one of those things”.)

See, many reasons why one would be intrigued enough by its premise to watch it – hence, my not-so-bold claim that it is some kind of winner. Some guy on a forum went on about how its publicity was raking in the ratings. But…come on, one look at that lousy, washed out, no-brainer of an advert and we know better, yes? “Shida Mirai and a stalk of Dandelion?!!! Oh god, I cannot wait to catch the drama.” But anyway, WHAT a digression. I was talking about the plot!

In summary: It started off brilliantly, peaked at Episode 2 and then it was all downhill from there. Or perhaps, an extended review to acknowledge the extraordinary silliness that must have gone into imagining up such a completely moronic drama: It started off brilliantly, peaked at Episode 2 – where the protagonist first made her stupid, stupid decision, went downhill from there, took a break from sucking because we see the protagonist suffering the First Consequences of her Stupid Decision (and we see that these Very Torturous Consequences are Well Deserved) and then went back to sucky, sucky, sucky.

…Oh. And then, the last 10 seconds or so with its ominous music redeemed it abit. My, what an exciting roller-coaster ride of a drama! (This, I will very unironically, admit – it is one engrossing heck of a drama. One watches on the edge of his seat to see just how far we can test the limits of Human Moronism. It is an experience quite akin to watch some fantastical record being broken on that Guiness Book of Records show.)  Perhaps I should be fair and elaborate, but then you must put up with the spoilers – they are inevitable if we must objectively evaluate this drama.

*** SPOILER ALERT!!!***

Episode 1 and 2 – When it was still Good

What happens in Episode 1 – as is customary for most Episodes 1 – is that our protagonist (Shida Mirai‘s Miki Ichinose) and her surrounding People are set up. Our protagonist, you will find, is this…zanily…happy person bursting forth with joie de vivre. For example, when we first meet her, she is greeting all her fellow schoolmates on the school radio show with an over-enthusiastic (all the more painful for its wretched pronounciation) “Hey Garlz!” and babbling away about school tests with a suppressed giggle in her voice. Because, well, school tests are a universally endearing topic. Her Mary Poppins mannerisms tether on annoying because well, how can anybody BE so happy but the sincerity with which she goes about Loving the World does indeed make her joy somewhat contagious and thus, she is “effervescent, bubbly, vivacious” more than “annoying” – it is a Good Happy. Good happy and comically, comically earnest. We laugh, maybe that’s why we ultimately don’t hate her. And she is (for now anyway) above all, refreshing…because, you know, how many teenage pregnancy cases are non-Emo; non-Angsty and Well-Adjusted?

The relationship between her and her “boyfriend” (well, they aren’t really, at the beginning of the show) was also Well Played. Again challenging convention, theirs is first shown to be a very innocent relationship with a pretty adorable scene by a river involving the cutest black puppy EVAAA.And yet, when the Deflowering (the most appropriate euphemism in consideration of her…flowery dramatics) happened, it was suitably hormonal (and thus believable) and not so completely and unnaturally out of the blue.

(Cute scene where they plunge into the river trying to save the Cutest Black Puppy in the World. They do not die – obviously – because the water is conveniently shallow enough so they don’t drown but deep enough so they don’t smash their legs or skulls diving in…Also because, it’d be that much more troublesome for producers if protagonists dropped dead before the plot had time to happen.)

(Don’t look like much here, but trust me. It’s a pretty quality scene when they…put the plot in motion, as it were.)

Don’t know ’bout you! But I really appreciated the drama’s challenging of conventions and that delicate balancing of elements (said couple’s childish innocence and adult desires, for example) which made that challenge happen so beautifully. And realistically. Was completely misled into expecting a first-rate drama that’d startle me into some good, honest reflection and review of my beliefs and values. Or you know…something.

Episode 2 again demonstrated the skillfulness of 14 Sai no Haha’s scriptwriters. The pace was urgent, the mood taut and tense and set up all the important relationships of the drama really well. Then again, I think the success of the drama at this point must be attributed more to the really, really adroit acting of  all the cast. Still, there were the clever scenes which made it so drove home so well the key facts – the rude shock of the fact of her pregnancy itself and the scarinesss of her being fourteen and unable to even purchase a pregnancy test with her…pocket money.

(This scene, I like! Another example of how some of these scenes are so sensitively, so compellingly shot – here, Miki’s father pleadingly begs them to uncover their prank. It tells such a powerful story about his absolute disbelief – no, more accurately – his yearning for it to be all untrue. True: Better a hideous prank in bad humour than a baby in the belly!)

And then.

And then they made a huge set-up of the kind of familial and societal pressures a fourteen year old mother would face. How? By (pretty accurately) guesstimating what sort of opposition might happen, what sort of negative implications might occur and then supersizing them to Hollywood proportions (I know! It isn’t even American!!!) and imagining up a few more problems. So you have:

1. (Very understandably) Miki’s parents absolutely dreading her pregnancy for the potential threats to their only daughter.

2. (Understandably) Miki’s Private School’s Staff Committee grappling with the potential negative publicity, bad influence on the children and

3. (Again, Understandably) The Very Angry Parents of Miki’s schoolfriends who worry about the potential bad influence on their offspring also.

4. (Bizarrely) Miki’s friends who are so pissed with Miki for soiling the school’s image (like teenagers care?!) they actually stop being friends with her. *snap* Just like that.

5. (Also Bizarrely) Miki’s brother who faces Alienation and Bullying Problems at school because a school-full of pre-pubescent boys feel enormous moral outrage at Miki’s being pregnant. (What a stick-in-the-mud bunch, huh.)

And then of course, for the story to even happen, we have Miki choosing despite all the smorgasbord of wonderful, wonderful reasons NOT to have a baby to…have a baby! And of course, in doing so she: 1. Endangers herself, 2.  disappoints her mother (who took up a part-time job to support her expensive private education), 3. disappoints her father (who worked overtime and such to earn a good enough salary for her expensive private education), 4. troubles the entire school committee and her Very Hot  Form Teacher (and how criminal is that!!! VERY!!!), 5. has her brother suffer alienation and bullying problems in school. Oh, she also 6.tarnishes her school reputation, ruining whatever effort her schoolfriends (who clearly care very much about the school’s street cred) must have put into letting the school flag fly high and 7. tarnishes her family’s reputation (because her nosey parker neighbours now absolutely disdain the ill-bred 14 year-old arse of an Ichinose representative).

(The adorable, adorable little brother, Kenta Ichinose played by Koshimizu Kazuki – completely let down by his bum sister and her foolhardiness.)

Last but certainly not the least! She decides on a baby inspite of all the thousand and one warnings about how financially, physically and mentally draining it is to raise a baby. As Wise Gynaecologist put it, giving birth would be the least of her concerns, raising a child’d require so much more. And as everybody’s who’s been to school knows: If you cannot pay for your own Pregnancy Test Kit; Do not go and have an expensive Baby. It is like, the Law of Home Economics! (not to mention, the very embodiment of Common Sense) What’s that to my mind? Selfish Selfish Selfish. Granted, I think the supersized proportions of her Opposition are (sometimes) very much unjustified. But given that they exist, Miki must be the First Class Idiot for going ahead anyway.  (Oh, and have I said, IRRESPONSIBLE?!)

So I hate her decision, LIKE MAD. LIKE MAD!!!

And because the show decides to glorify her foolhardiness (which of course, we are supposed to interpret as Moral Courage or Determination or Backbone or some such virtuous trait) and celebrate her…lunacy. That is why the show is all downhill from Episode 2 or 3.

(To be Continued)