ReviewFirst Gentleman movie review: Miki Nakatani plays Japan’s prime minister in comedy with shockingly regressive views on gender roles

The idea of a woman becoming the Japanese prime minister is apparently so preposterous that this comedy centres around the idea

Miki Nakatani plays the female politician, while Kei Tanaka plays her incompetent and bumbling husband in this anachronistic sexist travesty

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Miki Nakatani (centre) in a still from First Gentleman (category I, Japanese), directed by Hayato Kawai. Kei Tanaka co-stars.

Published: 9:49am, 26 May 2022

1/5 stars

First Gentleman, the new comedy from veteran Japanese television director Hayato Kawai, centres on the implausibility of a woman becoming prime minister of Japan.

It doesn’t seem to matter that the woman in question, Rinko Soma (played by award-winning actress Miki Nakatani) is a career politician and head of her own political party. The fact that she is female is apparently reason enough for hilarity to ensue.

Making things worse, the film, adapted from a novel by author Maha Harada, chooses to focus not on Rinko’s efforts to navigate the outdated, duplicitous and fiercely chauvinistic backwaters of Japanese politics, but on her helpless sap of a husband.

Kei Tanaka, star of the hugely popular Ossan’s Love franchise, plays Rinko’s eponymous spouse, Hiyori, who is blindsided by the notion that his successful, capable and ambitious wife has been promoted to the nation’s top job.

Hiyori has chosen not to join the family business, Soma Global, a vast corporate entity owned by his delightfully domineering mother (Kimiko Yo) and run by his vainglorious elder brother (Ainosuke Kataoka).