Digital Script ArchivesDetail
Drama Ningen Moyo: Yu gurete
- No.
- ST-00282
- Year
- 1983
- Broadcated
/Created by - ＮＨＫ
- Scriptwriter
- Yamada Taichi
- Format
- drama seriese
- Awards
- Galaxy Award for programs highly recommended (Keiko Kishi)/Galaxy Monthly Award
- Overview
- Keiji Seshima, the deputy manager of general affairs department at a securities firm, and his wife Kyoko live in a house in the suburbs of Tokyo. There they live a moderate life with their son Tsuneo, who studies at a college prep school, and Keiji’s father Kiichi. One day, however, Keiji, the head of the household, declares his intention to commute to his firm from an apartment in central Tokyo. The reason he gives is that his daily four-hour commute is tiring. However, the real reason is that he has become fed up of his everyday life over the years. Meanwhile, Keiji’s wife Kyoko complains that she is fed up with her life of housework after housework, and is tempted by an old classmate from junior high school days with whom she is reunited at a school reunion. The series depicts the emotional cravings of a middle-aged couple approaching the twilight of life, but in an indirect manner and through nuanced and realistic day-to-day family conversations. Tsuneo forgets to lock the front door, and Kiichi leads a reclusive lifestyle. Things like these add up to make Kyoko, who is discontent with her husband for not helping out with the housework, and Keiji, who wants to be left alone to relax at least when he is at home, have doubts about their current way of life. This is synchronized with Keiji’s feelings when he says to the classmate that Kyoko is seeing: “Is this the end of my life?” These realistic day-to-day scenes and indirect narration make Yu gurete’s message more persuasive. The husband’s desire to live alone, the wife’s boredom, which led to her yearning for love; the series depicts such emotional cravings of a middle-aged couple. It is the nuanced and realistic depictions of their respective day-to-day lives that make it so persuasive, especially Kyoko’s complaints toward her husband, father-in-law, and son, and her long conversations with other housewives in the neighborhood: “Being a stay-at-home mom is no fun at all.”
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