Sypnosis: Story revolves around a traditional Jap restaurant which still does things the very traditional way, eg. water from well, no food processors or microwave. The owner is a 23 yr old woman, Osen, who's always in a kimono, loves to drink & takes her duties of proprietress very seriously.
A typical Tokyo city chef came to the restaurant in an attempt to find the 'true' ways of cooking, & had to adjust to the restaurant culture where waste of ingredients is frowned upon, & where the weather & health conditions of the patrons are taken into account when planning the menu.
Every episode highlights the making of a particular Japanese food, eg. making of miso by hand, cooking rice by straw fire etc. The drama also showcases certain Japanese culture (eg. pottery, temple celebrations) & fine Japanese dining. What's best is how the show contrasts the fading of the old ways against the fast new pace of life.
Loves: The showcase of Jap food & culture! Makes me hungry just watching the fine dining presentations...............
Hates: Why didn't any romance blossomed between the 2 leads??????????? Was so looking forward towards the love story, esp. since the female lead seems to look forward to a date with the male lead in episode 4.
Realised I haven't been blogging about the shows I'm watching, partly cos I got so engrossed, I use all my free time to chase the good shows. Only after I've finished a drama serial do I remember to record & share it......
The craze this time is last season's Jap drama Osen. Took me some time to lay my hands on all 10 episodes, & I'm glad I did!
Though each episode is an individual story, it's very tempting to know what food would be featured in the next episode, & to know if the male & female lead would end up together.
So I end up feeling lack of sleep (again), & have a new love for the show's ending theme, 恋诗：
Sypnosis: Kimura Takuya is a primary school teacher, who reluctantly agreed to stand for election after his father & elder brother died in an air crash, so as to avoid having his mother take on the heavy responsibility. To his surprise, he won the election by a thin margin & thus became a parliment member. {episode 1}
Though he knew nothing about politics, he was nominated to be party leader, & hence the prime minister, by the ruling party's leading politician, who planned to take control of political power & use Kimura as a mere puppet. Kimura's clear understanding of the masses' day-to-day situation & his heartfelt speeches won him the distinction of being the youngest prime minister in Japanese history. {episodes 2 & 3}
He's helped by a capable secretary with her own political ambitions, a young admirer who simply wanted to help in whatever way she can, and a election planner with dashed political hopes. All 3 were with Kimura since the 1st elelction, & went on to become his close friends & colleagues in the prime minister's office. In the end, romance blossomed between the prime minister & his secretary.
Several episodes highlighted how Kimura's insistance on putting the country & the people's needs as priority, instead of just playing politics, touched the hearts of his own office personnel, his own party's senior, & even the opposition party's leader. There's also much detailing on how Kimura had to adjust to the political world, & how absurb some of the current systems are.
The 'evil' politician then realised Kimura would not be a mere figure head, & proceeded to put him in disgrace & force him to resign. But of course, Kimura has his own way to deal with the situation, hence a happy ending.
Favs: The show relied heavily on Kimura's charm & manner, to bring off the plot of a popular young politician with strong views on right & wrong. In the finale, Kimura actually has a 20 min speech explaining why he's going to quit his position of prime minister & dissolve the parliment for re-election. It's really quite impressive how he managed to hold the audience for that long, a must watch for Kimura fans.
Loved the comic relief brought about by the interaction between Kimura & his 3 helpers. And the plots on how Kimura try to fit in the political world seems quite realistic, eg. how he escaped from his bodyguards to live in his own house instead of the official prime minister's residence.
While the plots on how Kimura touched the hearts & changed the views of his fellow politicians are obviously idealistic, it's still quite watchable, as long as one bears in mind this isn't the real world. ;)
It's quite fun to watch the part where the masses just focused on what Kimura is wearing that day & totally ignores the political discussion of the day. And in episode 4, when Kimura is bombarded by tons of paperwork for qustioning the decision of certain government bodies, I can really identify with that work scenario!!!
Hates: Though the female secretary is very fitting in her role of capable secretary, I think she looks too old for Kimura in the show!!!!!! The actress is actually 1 year younger than Kimura Takuya, but in the show she looks older than him! Cannot tahan such a match!
And since Japan's political system is a bit different from what I'm familiar with, it's hard work reading the subtitles to follow the political plot. Had to re-watch many times.......
Watched 4 episodes of Change back-to-back till 3:30am yesterday night, or rather this morning. Partly was because got very irritated with son's repeated night wakenings that interrupted my viewing of episode 4 four times in an hour, so 'retaliated' by watching a further 2 shows.
Partly was, because, the show turns out to be quite fun to watch! 木村拓哉's character a bit similar to the one in Hero, where he's the idealist out on the job based on his dreams & not succumb to the unreasonable workings of the system.
This time, the system is the Japanese political scene, & though it's a world different from what I'm familiar with, luckily the main character is also a newbie to politics, & hence the female lead have to explain the innings to him (& thus the audience).
It's quite fun to watch how 木村拓哉 reformed the people working with him one by one. Though I know this is not really possible in the real world, the script is relatively well-written, such that the reasonings were all sensible & believeable, & if the audience haven't been hit by a cynical world, they may well believe that such a scenario may occur in real life.............
A fun plot was how 木村拓哉 became the youngest prime minister in Jap history: all the female voters were smitten by the new 'Parliment Prince', a single, good-looking 35 yr old ex-primary school teacher who's willing to follow his strong moral values & not submit to the 'evils' of the political world. Thinking he'll be an easy puppet to manipulate, the bad guy of the show pushed him to the post of prime minister, so as to secure his party's standing in parliment & enable him to seize real power. Of course, in subsequent episodes, 木村拓哉 showed he's not the mindless puppet he was thought to be.
This plot would be easily accepted if you forget the Japanese culture & imagine the Japanese adopt certain American traits. ;P
Can't wait to see how 木村拓哉 reform the bad guy...............oh, pretty sure this will be the way the story goes, it's that type of fairy tale, see?
Motivation: Haven't watched a good romantic comedy for a long time, so tried the new spring season drama serial the moment I knew about it, even though didn't know any of the actors. Besides, the plot seems interesting.
Synopsis (of 1st episode only): Female lead is a nice, serious girl who can never to get a boyfriend, always falling for the wrong kind of guy & too shy to express her feelings. She signed a contract with a company she got to know at her fav bar, thinking it is a match-making agency. Turns out the company, Kronos Heaven, is launching a new Nightly Lovers series of human robots, & she had signed up for a free trial of the prototype.
The 1st male lead is the robot, named Knight. He's programmed to meet all the girl's expectations of an ideal boyfriend, including the requirement to be the "knight in shining armour saving the girl in distress". By the end of Episode 1, he's managed to reduce the female lead's fear of him as a "humanoid electrical home appliance" to a grudging acceptance of a robotic friend.
Meanwhile, the younger son of the company director, a seemingly irresponsible playboy (2nd male lead), begins to notice the female lead, a result of her comments on the company's new dessert menu.
Faves: Loved the simple fact there's finally a live-action drama adaptation of this kind of manga! There're lots of manga on humanoid robots, but this is the 1st drama serial I know of. Show is light-hearted yet has no exaggerating scenes. Plus, it's a romantic love triangle story of 2 guys fighting for a girl. What more could a gal ask for?????
Hates: None till now.........well, not after the 1st episode. The only disappointment is, the 1st male lead is not my type of dream guy. ;) Lucky female lead & 2nd male lead are acceptable to me.........
Chaseability: will definitely follow this show faithfully every week!!!!! can't wait for the next episode! wanna see how the 2nd male lead falls in love with the female lead!!!!!!
Motivation: Like the leading actor after the show that propelled him to fame, Nodame Cantibile. Plus, the show is supposed to be the best drama serial for the winter season it was aired.
Sypnosis: A man who's been unlucky all his life ends up in a temp teaching post in Nara, where he was suddenly confronted by a talking Deer, who needs him to transport an ancient sacred artifact from the Executor of the Fox, so as to conduct an ancient ceremony to sustain the confinement on the Whale trapped below Japan, else it will break free & cause Mount Fuji to erupt, eventually breaking up Japan.
When the relectunt hero made the mistake of getting the wrong artifact, he was punished by the Deer & henceforth would see a deer's head instead of his own reflection. To complete his mission & get his own reflection back, he must uncover the identity of the Transporter of the Mouse, who aimed to thwart the ceremony & keep the artifact for his own purposes. The hero was aided in his mission by his colleague, a blur History teacher who fell in love with him, & the Executor of the Deer, his student, who also suffered the same punishment.
Faves: loved the beautiful way Nara was filmed! I loved the place, so really enjoyed watching the beautiful scenery shown!
Thought the way the Japanese folklore of the Whale was linked to the Nara deer & the Kyoto fox very clever & innovative, quite convincing! Very entertaining & relaxing show!
Hates: none! ;) Don't expect Jurassic Park-level computer graphics though: the talking deer puppet & animation is quite obvious by movie standards, but good enough not to ruin the show.
Re-watchability: Wanna watch it once again, since it was enjoyable, but not in the near future. Have to wait till I've forgotten part of the plot 1st.
