This article is written by Adai
In 1991, there was a "Crazy Flower at the End of the Road", which ended with a strangling and breathless "flying car cliff". It seems to draw a box: the resistance of forced women can only be so pathetic.
25 years later, at Japan's Haneda Airport, Ryoko Hiromi and Yuki Uchida smile and bathe in the sun and embark on a happy escape. Will this be a reminder of the progress of the times?
Naomi and Kanako, a 2016 Japanese drama based on Hidero Okuda's original work, covers social issues such as women's workplace status and domestic violence that we often discuss to this day.
Naomi, played by Ryoko Hiromi, has excellent work ability and works for the foreign affairs department of a department store. But she was deeply depressed because her identity as a woman was never reused.
Kanako, played by Yuki Uchida, is Naomi's college friend who has just moved to a nearby apartment. Kanako is currently a full-time housewife, and her husband, Hattori Tatsuro, is a bank elite, humble and courteous to the outside world, and has a successful career.
Her friend's life seems to be happy and complete, but Kanako has often been subjected to domestic violence by her husband since marriage, and she constantly endures and does not want to die.
Naomi, who inadvertently learns the truth, is very worried about her friend's situation, and she is inspired by her interactions with Her Chinese client Li Jumei (Junko Takahata), and from Lin Longhui, a Shanghai stowaway who is exactly the same as the minister of kimono. After this, she tries to persuade Kanako to plot together to kill the unsympathetic tyrant husband... (Douban)
This is a suspense story with "murder" as the main line, but it makes people hold their breath all the way to work with the two protagonists to not kill the DV man and never give up (DV: Domestic violence).
The biggest attraction of the show has not only stayed in the two female protagonists (Ryoko Hiromi and Uchida Yuki). Although the pairing of them is enough to attract people's attention: the sister of Ryoko, the last beautiful girl in Japan in the 20th century, and the little brother Uchida, who is known for her pregnant eyes (looking at her eyes will make people pregnant).
The greater joy of this TV series is that it shows how Kanako, a woman who has been subjected to domestic violence, gradually becomes stronger in self-help.
Hattori Does Give Kanako a good living condition, but he is psychopathic.
Originally, Kanako worked in a large enterprise before marriage, with strong ability and not bad treatment. Since marrying Hattori, she obeyed her husband's wishes and resigned at home, she has a gentle temperament and is indisputable with others, and only hopes to live a plain life with her husband and children. Hattori Hattori despises housewives from the bottom of his heart, but does not allow Kanako to work after marriage. He is gentle and courteous on the outside, but deep inside he has a heinous tendency toward domestic violence, often punching kanako without warning. After the incident, he would also cry on his knees, sincerely apologize to his wife and promise not to commit violence again, but the next time he still showed his original form and intensified his violence.
Naomi is intelligent, kind and righteous. She grew up in a family of domestic violence, and it was not until her father died that she saw her mother get a new life, so she understood that "the only way to end violence is to make the perpetrator disappear forever." After being promoted by President Li, the Chinese aunt assisted by God, she encouraged her friends to start their lives again without stopping.
President Li is a role that cannot be ignored in the play: as soon as she appeared, it was difficult for Naomi to step down, and she Chinese snapped up goods and coveted small bargains, almost making people think that this was a drama of the Black Heavenly Dynasty.
But if you look closely, it is not at all, the Chinese aunt in this drama is spicy and sophisticated, and she is still a chivalrous person. It was she who told Naomi categorically: in the face of domestic violence, you have to resist, DV men dare to slap you, you have to slap him back, you can't fight, just find a group of people to help, can't beat him, then directly kill him. The cause of the murder probably began here.
When Naomi proposes, let's kill your husband! Although Kanako did not agree at the time, it was like a spark, enough to wait for the opportunity to burn. Naomi undoubtedly became Kanako's lifesaver and played the role of savior.
Kanako starts out like all abusive wives, always with hope in pain and fear that there will be no next time. Therefore, Kanako's personality at the beginning is weak, and she is willing to bear it herself and swallow her anger, looking happy in front of her friends. She said nothing about what her husband had done, including her closest family and best friends. She feared that her relatives and friends would be implicated and that she would be brutally retaliated against by her husband. If she was still in the position of being advised and instigated at the beginning, kanako was more determined, meticulous, and calm than Naomi when the plan entered the preparatory stage. She studied the tools of the crime, the way of committing the crime, and the follow-up response to the crime.
At this point, Kanako and Naomi are no longer protected and saviors, but truly become equal accomplices, in the parlance of the play, "accomplices.". By the time the plan was implemented, Naomi was already frightened and weak, and it was Kanako who soberly tightened the rope around her husband's neck. In other words, the person who made the decision in the end was Kanako herself. From being able to endure and endure, and making big things small to "either you die or I die", she has walked a path of re-understanding herself and liberating herself. Fifth, it should also be mentioned that Naomi has undergone some interesting changes from the strong side and Kanako from the overwhelmed side. This varied sense of balance increases the interaction between the characters, so that the audience will not be bored, and is also a highlight of the show.
This is particularly reminiscent of "The End of the Road". But "The Last Wild Flower" depicts a journey, a process of two women fighting against the entire patriarchal society, which is brilliant and tragic. In contrast, "Naomi and Kanako" does not have so much ambition in terms of theme, but it is no different from the determination to tear apart the patriarchal society.
From 1991 to 2016, and then to this year, this struggle may have continued... The endings are not the same, but hope remains.
(Image from the Internet, copyright belongs to the original author)