Bakayaro! 2: Shiawase ni Naritai

Bakayaro! 2: Shiawase ni Naritai (1989)

Genres - Comedy  |   Run Time - 98 min.  |   Countries - United States  |   MPAA Rating - NR
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Synopsis by Jonathan Crow

Noted director Yoshimitsu Morita -- noted in the West for Family Game -- writes and produces this wacky omnibus collection of comic shorts. For a language which has few of the juicy four-letter explicatives of English or German, the word Bakayaro -- meaning idiot or fool -- is one of a handful of Japanese words that packs a punch. Each one of this film's segments ends with the main character shouting the titular utterance. In the first section, a harried travel agent (Nenji Kobayashi) spends a large part of his weekends apologizing to furious clients for his mistakes and to his family for never being at home. While guzzling ulcer medication and caffeinated vitamin drinks, he hatches on a scheme to ameliorate his familial woes -- he and his clan will go on a week-long vacation to the South Pacific island of New Caledonia. Unfortunately, his boss has other plans. The next section, directed by Gen Suzuki concerns a young clerk at an all-night convenience mart. He spends most of his time barking at nocturnal perverts, slurping down stale oden and watching porn. When his ideal woman walks in the door, his imagination starts to race and soon this mystery woman mixes with the weirdoes to stage an exuberant rebellion against anything and everything. In the third section, a pair of newlyweds are deliriously happy as they move into their new apartment, swapping high fives as they do household chores. Then their neighbor, a technology-enthusiast, informs them that their appliances, particularly their stereo, are woefully behind the times. Chastened, the couple quickly ventures to Akiharabara, a Tokyo neighborhood where the latest electronic gadgets are sold. Their experience grows increasingly embarrassing and expensive, until the young husband is driven to shout bakayaro from his balcony. The film's final sequence concerns Rie Sema (Kuniko Yamada), a twenty-six-year- old career woman who is looking for something more out of life. She dumps her boyfriend, quits her job and returns to her hometown in the country, where her mother tells her to get married and the people at the employment bureau tell her to go back to Tokyo. She does, only to make a surprising discovery.