Giants and Toys (1958)
Directed by Yasuzo Masumura
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Synopsis by Tom Vick
Yasuzo Masumura's dark satire of postwar Japan's cutthroat business culture stars Hiroshi Kawaguchi as Nishi, a young executive for a candy company locked in fierce competition with two rival companies. By chance he and another executive in his company meet a loudmouthed female taxi driver with bad teeth, Kyoko (Hitomi Nozoe), who they transform, through a clever marketing campaign, into an unlikely sex symbol to launch their new line of caramels. Nishi also tries to extract information about his competitors' marketing plans through an old college friend at one company and a girlfriend at another. Along the way he finds himself falling for Kyoko, but finds that the worlds of business and love are painfully incompatible.
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Keywords
advertising, business-rivalry, cab-driver, candy, executive, corporate-espionage, love