A failed cinema owner, his estranged wife, and a suicidal soapland worker walk into a 64-minute fever dream.
Matsutaro runs a small movie theater, but due to the recession, it is not very popular. His wife Junko lives separately from him because he is impotent, and runs a video shop. One day, a young woman named Mirai attempts suicide in the movie theater. Mirai regains her strength and starts using the massage techniques she learned at the soapland to cure Matsutaro's impotence, but...
Writing
Turns economic anxiety and impotence into absurdist soap opera.
Acting
Shouko Oginome commits fully to the healing-through-massage premise.
Director
Mototsugu Watanabe
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Part of the infamous 'Groper Train' series—yes, there's a franchise—this entry is notably softer, with director Watanabe bringing his signature 'tender sleaze' approach that made him a cult favorite in 1980s pink cinema.
The 'soapland' massage techniques Mirai employs were actual services in 1980s Japan, making this bizarrely educational—Watanabe essentially made a horny economic survival guide disguised as melodrama.
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