ReviewAristocrats movie review: Mugi Kadowaki, Kiko Mizuhara question women’s place in Japanese society in compelling drama

Mugi Kadowaki and Kiko Mizuhara play two young women in Tokyo from vastly different backgrounds who both struggle in a society based on outdated traditions

They brilliantly portray the young, educated urban pair’s frustrations with family expectations and life as second class citizens because of their gender

2-MIN READ2-MIN

Mugi Kadowaki (left) and Kiko Mizuhara in a scene from Aristocrats (category: I, Japanese), directed by Yukiko Sode.

Published: 4:15pm, 9 Nov 2021

3.5/5 stars

Yukiko Sode’s Aristocrats shows that even young educated urban women in Japan remain beholden to a society predicated on outdated traditions and family expectations. Its release comes months after Eiji Uchida’s Midnight Swan won the top prize at the Japanese Academy Awards and suggested that attitudes towards Japan’s minority groups have taken an encouraging step forward.

Regardless of their social standing, providing financial support for parents and male heirs for the family business are still valued more highly than any personal or professional goals they may have set for themselves.

Hanako (Mugi Kadowaki) and Miki (Kiko Mizuhara) both live in Tokyo, are in their mid-twenties and hail from vastly different backgrounds. Hanako is the youngest of three daughters of a successful doctor. Her family is anxious to see her married off as soon as possible, going so far as to set her up with a number of eligible young men who could one day take over her father’s practice.

Miki, conversely, grew up poor in the provinces and worked hard to gain a place at Tokyo’s prestigious Keio University. But her father is a deadbeat and her mother is demanding that Miki quit her studies to come home and provide for her parents.

Their lives become entwined after Hanako becomes hastily engaged to Koichiro (Kengo Kora), her latest arranged suitor. Through her friend Itsuko (Shizuka Ishibashi), Hanako learns that her fiancé has a suspiciously close relationship with Miki, an event planner.