Japan: A Story of Love and Hate (2008) - full transcript
Naoki once had it all - the fast car, the executive home. Boss of his own business he lived the good-life when Japan's economy was at it's height. Then the bubble burst - and he met Yoshie.
(pants)
- It's so common trick,
after five, where's the script?
After five years.
Five years is like five years.
It's only two of
those that you plan,
still, the door inside Japan,
getting inside Japan,
the sliding doors of
Japan remain firmly closed.
This track, jog and think
of lines of commentary,
think of ways to film
the film that wasn't happening.
To get out of my hotel room,
to stop getting depressed,
to stop drinking,
to stop taking sleeping pills.
Most days,
I seem to be getting nowhere,
and most nights I just
wanted to fly home.
Now, Grace pushed me away,
taken Ted (mumbles).
'Cause I filmed
them in the hot tub.
Which seemed
completely innocent to me.
And now I've got Naoki.
So, I've started to
film Naoki again.
And I love Naoki.
I'm so happy.
I feel great, left me here,
'cause now I'm
filming Naoki again.
He seemed to be the
only person I was filming
who didn't judge me, who
didn't expect me to be Japanese.
And who didn't mind me making
my stupid British mistakes.
(mumbles) he tell
me privately last night,
he doesn't like British people,
but he likes me, ha!
I'd come to Japan to make a film
about what makes
this crazy place tick,
but two years on,
I'm more confused than ever.
(sings in foreign language)
My mission was to
make a film about Tokyo
for BBC and then HKTV,
but having failed,
I'd come 300 miles north
to a rural town called Yamagata.
Wow, this is tiny street.
This was my last attempt
at getting inside Japan.
I've been told about Naoki,
a person who'd
broken all the rules,
a radical Communist regime
who'd gone on to be a
successful entrepreneur,
but when I met him,
he was working part
time at the post office.
Are you collecting
insurance money?
- Not insurance, fee over there.
Yeah, yeah, insurance money.
I have no insurance (chuckles).
(scooter rumbles)
- [Sean] Hey, slow down!
Slow down!
(sings in foreign language)
Is it okay to take a break?
- It's okay.
- [Sean] Legal?
- I don't know about legal.
But it's natural.
- [Sean] Right.
In a time when it was totally
unacceptable to divorce,
he'd been married three times
and was now struggling
in a relationship
with a girl half his age.
(soft upbeat music)
She wants you to get
a second job, yeah?
- Huh?
- [Sean] Your girlfriend.
- Ah, yeah.
- [Sean] Wants you
to get job number two.
- Yes, she wants.
I'm troublesome for her.
She hates me.
(Sean chuckles)
- [Sean] Do you hate her?
- No, I need her.
- [Sean] Why?
- To survive the
fucking this country.
- [Sean] Now,
he was a breath of fresh air,
a rebel was a rare thing here.
- He was a Maoist.
(laughs)
It's very the extreme people.
You were making bombing.
Put fire,
and threw that overhead.
Because we love baseball,
the underthrow is not so good.
(laughs)
- [Sean] Who were you bombing?
The police?
- No, big company.
- [Sean] Really?
- [Naoki] Yes.
- [Sean] It was rare to be
invited to a Japanese home,
but Naoki wanted to show me his.
He told me to treat carefully,
things were sensitive.
She's asleep.
I was shocked by the
tiny room with no windows
where he'd been living
with his girlfriend Yoshie
for the last five years.
When his last
business went under,
she'd saved him
from being homeless.
But now she'd had to take
a second job to support him.
Their situation
was the last thing
I expected to find in Japan,
the second richest
nation on earth.
(people speak in
foreign language)
Now he was forced to take
the only job he could find,
part time at the Central
Yamagata post office.
Part time here means
working seven hours a day
for just 3.50 pounds an hour.
(bell rings)
Until now,
I felt locked out of Japan,
but naoki was keen
to get me inside.
(light upbeat music)
(speaks in foreign language)
Each day starts at 8:00 a.m.
with early morning exercises.
It was like landing on the moon:
Grown men dancing in suits.
Was this modern high tech Japan?
(speaks in foreign language)
The Japanese view the
workplace as one happy family.
But as a foreigner here,
it didn't feel like home to me.
(light upbeat music)
(speaks in foreign language)
I wondered how Naoki,
a life-long outsider,
would cope with the pressure
of being a part of
this Japanese family.
- It's kind of role playing,
same thing every day.
Some people crazy,
go to hospital.
- [Sean] Really?
- Yeah.
Depress.
- [Sean] Really?
- Yeah, because every
day check from the boss,
Why did you get every day zero?
Every day zero, fuck you!
You are not human!
You are under the animal.
Why?
You are stealing your salary,
every day steal, stolen.
Yeah, depressed,
depressed, depressed.
- [Sean] So they go
to mental hospital?
- Yes.
30,000 people kill themself.
- [Sean] 30,000?
- Yeah, 30,000.
A big shame.
But you gave me this
fucking capitalist system
one hundred years
ago (chuckles).
First the East India company,
and after China, after Japan.
Open the country.
- [Sean] Yeah.
(Naoki chuckles)
And now you're rich.
- Is this rich?
Is military rich?
Is good system?
You gave me.
- [Sean] Sorry.
(Naoki chuckles)
(upbeat, dramatic music)
Just over one hundred years ago,
Japan was a closed country,
until the West forced
it to open its doors
and trade with the
rest of the world.
It was then it adopted
our capitalist system,
that has made it the second
richest nation on earth.
(sings in foreign language)
Naoki ran a number of
successful businesses.
But the economy
collapsed in 1992.
And like thousands of others,
he lost everything.
Now, there's more pressure
on everyone to work harder.
As jobs for life are
no more in Japan,
Naoki took the only
work he could find,
part time collecting
life insurance premiums
for the post office.
He gets paid six times
less than the full timers.
But at least he is free
from having to meet
their daily sales targets.
- I realise it one moment,
they have no good results.
They walk like this.
- [Sean] Do you think
they are successful today?
- They?
No (chuckles).
- [Sean] Why?
- Too early.
(speaks in foreign language)
(scooter rumbles)
I'm free!
(scooter rumbles)
This is Yamagata city.
You can see the
big one building.
- [Sean] Naoki wanted
to show me his hometown
and pointed out the six-bedroom
house where he used to live.
After the family
business went bust,
he fell out with his brother.
He hasn't spoken to him since.
Today,
he has no one left in the city,
except his girlfriend Yoshie.
- Our family, my brother,
me had three houses in the city.
And two company, on, two, thee,
two company, one bar.
And I had a BMW.
I bought the BMW new with cash,
70 million yen.
- [Sean] Do you
remember Naoki's bar?
Is that where you met
Naoki for the first time?
Is that where you met,
in your bar?
(phone ringtone) - So, so.
Customer.
- [Sean] Customer?
- [Sean] I was told
not to make a sound
when Yoshie's clients called up.
To them she was single.
Since Naoki had moved in,
she had to supplement his
income by taking extra jobs.
- Customer believes
she is single.
So every night,
every day they invite
and propose to get to date.
- [Sean] But they
just want to talk
and they just want to eat,
they don't want anything else,
or do they want to--
- Yeah, just to talk and to
eat and sing a song together.
- [Sean] Nothing else?
- Nothing else.
- [Sean] No kissing?
- No kissing.
Sometimes they touch.
Do they have a kiss?
Her boss suggest her, like here.
- [Sean] Keep her legs together.
- Yeah.
This is so polite.
- [Sean] Right.
(speaks in foreign language)
- Everything, you have to
compliment for their customer.
(chuckles)
- Eye shadow (chuckles).
- [Sean] Are you happy?
- [Naoki] I'm busy,
I have no time
to think about the fucking way.
- [Sean] Are you happy
in your first job more
or your second job more?
- [Naoki] Enjoy.
I can be female in night time.
Every nights, every day,
work, work, work
to get money.
It's poverty, our level.
- [Sean] How many
hours working together all,
day job and night job together?
- 15.
- [Sean] Hours?
- Hours a day.
- [Sean] It's tough!
- Yeah, it's capitalism now.
She wants to sleep.
But have to go.
- [Sean] Yoshie
was always nervous
when she was out with Naoki,
in case she was seen with
him by her regular customers.
Where's she going?
- Yeah, you can take a film,
they will meet soon.
- [Sean] So, they're a long way,
they're a long way away,
don't worry.
She'd known this
customer as long as Naoki.
He'd take her for
expensive sushi meals,
and then on to her club,
where she'd be
bought drinks all night.
(soft music)
(sings in foreign language)
In a society where
people find it hard to talk,
I found it strange
to be in a bar,
where Yoshie's job was to talk,
mainly to married men.
The bar,
another room with no windows
felt like a release from a
highly competitive world outside,
where it is totally
acceptable to be drunk
in order to unwind.
(sings in foreign language)
But that must make
you feel terrible.
But how do you keep
the strength to carry on?
- [Interpreter]
Because it's a job.
(hairdryer swooshes)
- [Sean] It seems like a
relentless schedule of work.
After five hours of
sleep they were up again
and off like clockwork.
Naoki makes up for his small
income by being househusband,
a difficult role for a 56-year-old
Japanese man to accept.
Each morning he must
make Yoshie's breakfast
and lunch box before
doing the laundry.
He told me she'd
sometimes tease him
about his poorly paid
job at the post office.
But he had nowhere else to go,
almost totally reliant on her.
I can't help but noticing
there was not physical
contact between them.
Kiss him goodbye.
Kiss.
(chuckles)
Bye-bye. - Bye-bye.
- [Sean] Today Yoshie
works 15 hours in three jobs,
Naoki just seven
hours at the post office,
then back home to do the house
work and get the dinner on.
Do you enjoy being with her?
- I don't want to be homeless
and I need a partner.
- [Sean] She's
stranded you in a way.
- Yeah, she gave me
job (chuckles) to survive.
- [Sean] Do you
think she needs you?
Do you keep her strength?
- Me, maybe I am not confident.
I have not confident to
give her this kind of strength.
- [Sean] Naoki said they'd get
an hour together between jobs
which they'd usually
spend sleeping.
Since starting
at the post office,
he said they'd lost an important
part of their relationship.
- These days I have
no sex (chuckles).
Doesn't work (chuckles).
Broken.
- [Sean] Oh dear me.
- Depressing the mental disease,
like this.
Doesn't work,
my baby (chuckles).
- [Sean] Must be difficult
for you if you're so young,
when he was your age,
he was very active.
- If I have more
kind of stable life,
I can do the sex,
having sex, maybe.
- [Sean] She said
she doesn't need sex.
- She has to say in
front of your camera.
She's young.
But I'm afraid.
Yes, she loves me,
but she needs,
sometimes she needed
a friend of the sex.
I'm afraid, I worry about
having a new boyfriend.
- [Sean] Tried Viagra?
- [Naoki] Yoshie?
No.
- [Sean] So,
you're ready for work?
- I have to go sushi shop.
- [Sean] Soon?
- Soon.
- [Sean] To meet the customer?
- Yes.
He said I envy you.
- [Sean] I don't think so.
Tonight's a busy night?
- No.
- [Sean] Quiet?
- Yes.
- [Sean] What time
are you finishing?
- Twelve.
- [Sean] Okay, see you later.
Have a nice night.
- See you later.
- [Sean] See you later.
Naoki said he'd never
talk so openly with Yoshie.
Normally she
doesn't like to talk.
He said he could never be sure
what she was thinking.
(cars rumble)
- My life, when I have a wife,
I talk, talk, talk.
- [Sean] Really?
- Yeah.
- [Sean] And this life no talk?
- Yoshie dislike the talking.
She told me, Noisy,
shut up, like this.
I love talking.
- [Sean] Why is she
with you do you think?
- I don't know.
I am able to say,
it not my speaking.
Maybe I'm useful.
Maybe she loves me.
But she cannot
allow me my income.
Everyday we have kind of
the stress and struggle, and--
- [Sean] Does she blame you?
- Yes, too much drink every day.
She was tired, she is tired.
Maybe tonight, after drinking,
she became very strong to
express her true mind this time.
(Sean laughs)
- [Yoshie] You.
- Maybe I love her?
- [Sean] Maybe you love her?
- [Naoki] Sleep.
(coins clink)
(speaks in foreign language)
- [Robotic Voice] Compliance.
- [Sean] What's
your favourite word?
- [Robotic Voice] Compliance.
Compliance.
- [Sean] Compliance
to when he touches you
and says, Did you shave today?
- Yes, yes, before,
out of the compliance.
- [Sean] You've got to
be well shaved every day.
- Yes.
I touch here.
Who?
Hi, Mister Sato-san,
you have to shave.
Fuck you, I wanted say,
Fuck you, it's my business.
But I couldn't say.
- [Sean] What did you then say?
- I'm afraid of fire.
- [Sean] What did you say?
- Yes (chuckles).
Yes, man, I will.
- [Sean] Oh dear.
- Yeah, it's miserable.
I'll show you.
(speaks in foreign language)
Broken.
- [Sean] By her.
- You can take this one and
this one and you can repair
and after like this,
different colour.
- [Sean] I was thinking, No, no!
The glasses are expensive,
expensive,
and over 50 (mumbles), like--
(laughs)
- She laughs!
Your fault!
Your fault, you know?
- [Sean] Oh, could you
give me one of those once?
- [Naoki] This one,
no, this one.
- [Sean] Each evening
Yoshie takes her calm down pill,
an antidepressant that
guarantees a good six-hour sleep.
(Yoshie speaks in
foreign language)
How long does it take to work?
She said she wasn't alone.
Many of her friends and
work colleagues do the same.
Within minutes Yoshie
went into a mad eating frenzy.
Naoki seemed to used to it.
He said the pill also
causes memory loss.
She doesn't remember
anything in the morning.
It's a funny situation in here.
- Yeah.
We cannot get the special treat
from government, cannot get.
If we are European,
the nation give me
a kind of a welfare,
kind of a mental.
- [Sean] Psychologists,
psychiatrists support.
- So many supports.
- They don't really exist here,
right?
- Yeah, yeah.
So, firstly,
I have to protect her.
But I'm afraid she
has a kind of disease,
so I can't to separate,
I can't leave her.
Who does look after her?
I'm happy you interview me.
So if possible,
you report all over the world.
This is Japan.
It's a part of Japan.
It's true.
- [Sean] Especially, poor.
- [Naoki] Not special poor.
This is usual poor
in Japan (chuckles).
- [Sean] Japan prided itself
on being the most egalitarian
society in the world.
But the gap
between rich and poor
has never been wider than today.
What happens now?
- The machine
takes out the husk.
- [Sean] Naoki's generation
was part of an economic army
to rebuild this place after
the war, making it rich.
But after the economy
crashed in the early 1990s,
there was no safety net
for the thousands
who became homeless.
Naoki says he would be with them
if it wasn't for Yoshie.
- [Naoki] This is student,
10,000 people.
- [Sean] 10,000?
Occasionally Naoki would
look at a political films,
he'd helped make in the 1960s.
I was surprised by the
scale of protest here.
A riot police.
- [Naoki] Yeah,
this is very strong.
- [Sean] Did the police
come and remove you?
- [Naoki] Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [Sean] Violently?
- Yeah, usually.
- [Sean] Did you hit them?
- Yeah, they hit me.
- [Sean] Did you hit them back?
- So, I'm crazy now (chuckles).
Every night, we had demonstration
with city (mumbles).
- [Sean] But the point
of the demonstration
was to ask the
Americans to go home.
- Yes.
To stop the repair
for Vietnam tank.
- [Sean] Oh, for Vietnam!
This was a stark
contrast to Japan today,
where everyone seems
so scared and obedient.
Allowing me to
film his situation,
seemed to be the only
political act Naoki had left.
- We're terrible poor.
New class, working poor.
- [Sean] I realise,
Naoki and Yoshie
were part of the hidden
underclass, called the new poor.
Yoshie's three jobs net
her 11,000 pounds a year.
Naoki get's less
than half of that.
When it was about survival,
they clearly worked as a team.
But each month Yoshie
would escape to her hometown,
causing tension between them.
- Next Sunday is memorial day
in her hometown.
- [Sean] Oh, next Sunday.
- Next Sunday.
- [Sean] Is she going home?
- Yes.
- [Sean] Should we go?
- No, the family deny me.
- [Sean] Wow.
So we can't go?
- Yeah.
- [Sean] Why the
family deny him?
- I don't know.
(chuckles)
They hate my experiences.
- [Sean] What experiences?
Oh, the divorce?
- So many divorces.
- [Sean] So,
you're a black sheep.
You're like a black sheep.
- Yeah, yeah, yeah.
(bright, upbeat music)
(sings in foreign language)
- [Sean] Yoshie told me why
Naoki feared meeting her father.
Not only was he a
true blue Conservative,
but they were the same age.
She said her parents
knew of their relationship
but preferred not
to mention his name.
- Natto.
- I'll try.
(speaks in foreign language)
Look, he's moved away,
it's dangerous.
- [Sean Voiceover]
The Japanese love
to give foreigners nattos.
It's a traditional dish made
from rotting soya beans.
It was like eating
a big ball of snot.
- Beautiful.
Beautiful.
Beautiful.
(people chuckle)
It felt like I was
sitting in Naoki's place.
It was bizarre they could happily
welcome me, the foreigner,
but not Naoki.
Yoshie was
frustrated with Naoki.
She said his fears
of meeting her family
meant their relationship
would always be on the rocks.
(dog barks)
Yoshie's father didn't speak
to me for most of my visit,
but as I put my camera down,
he asked me a very
strange question.
The price of Viagra in London.
Maybe he and Naoki
have more in common,
than just being the same age.
Thank you very much for having
us, see you next time, yeah?
(speaks in foreign language)
(laughs)
Why did you get jealous.
- Because I need her.
Because here, it's not history,
it's not alive, it's not,
she is my life.
Because maybe,
you know, getting old.
I have no plan to
visit her hometown.
- [Sean] Why?
- I don't know.
It's kind of a decision.
- [Sean] Why?
'Cause I think her
father would accept you.
He's very easy going.
- No.
Your opinion easy, not easy.
Not easy, same age!
- [Sean] It's difficult for you,
but if you want to do it,
you got to do it,
otherwise don't do it.
- No, I cannot.
If I had a daughter,
I would say, Stop,
that's fucking guy (chuckles).
Rubbish.
I knew.
Who can recommend the Naoki?
Nobody can.
Nobody can recommend, get
along together good with Naoki.
Nobody.
- [Sean] Why?
- I don't know.
- [Sean] I do.
- You do, just only you,
you crazy (chuckles).
People hates normally,
people hate anarchism.
People hate the terrorists.
Like that, it's common sense.
- [Sean] You're not a terrorist.
- No (chuckles).
- [Sean] You're not
an anarchist anymore.
- Not anarchist.
- [Sean] You're a postman.
- Yeah (chuckles),
yeah, postman.
Part time.
(clock rings)
- [Sean] This was so far removed
from the workplace
I knew in Britain.
It was like Communism
pretending to be Capitalism.
(speaks in foreign language)
I felt underneath the
surface the fragility
that no one wanted
to acknowledge.
- Someone, he (mumbles),
sweater, he has disease,
disease guy.
- [Sean] Very depressed.
- Depressed.
- [Sean] Is he recovered?
- Maybe now, at the hospital.
He went to hospital, very big.
- [Sean] So he was off
work for a few months.
- Yeah,
something with the medicine.
He gets, sometimes he
doesn't wake up in the morning.
- [Sean] So he never comes in.
- Yeah.
- [Sean] Shit.
(speaks in foreign language)
(soft pensive music)
Naoki told me he'd
been bullied at work too.
He tried talking
to Yoshie about it,
but she was too tired
listening to everyone else.
(soft pensive music)
He introduced me to a workmate
who'd got ill with stress
and would spend
his breaks sleeping.
This man would spend
weekends in the mountains
picking bags of sticky mushrooms
and insist on giving them to us.
(soft pensive music)
As a Japanese saying goes,
the nail that stands out
must be hammered down.
(soft pensive music)
(sighs)
- Tonight we will go
to mushroom man.
Promise.
- [Sean] Oh my God.
- I promised to meet
the mushroom man.
- [Sean] Okay.
Oh, no, more mushrooms!
Does he know it's there?
- Nameko.
- Tell him we started to
call him mushroom man.
(chuckles)
(laughs)
- [Sean] Oh, it's beautiful!
Did you get it in the mountain?
Wow, you picked it.
Oh, wow, wow.
(speaks in foreign language)
- [Naoki] Burned out.
- [Sean] I was
worried about Naoki.
He seemed isolated.
I felt he and Yoshie
were drifting further apart.
- I will stop to argue.
Because I'm afraid
she retaliates.
She has a place to run away.
Her home, hometown.
I have no, just here.
Or she decide to fuck me away.
I have to go.
- [Sean] Where?
- On the road, maybe.
I couldn't borrow.
No bank, no friend, no home.
So this is a way
to go to homeless.
- [Sean] One step to homeless.
- Yeah, it's very near,
my position is very, very close.
- [Sean Voiceover] Naoki
was desperate to talk.
Yoshie was pretending
nothing was wrong.
I knew they'd hardly
spoken a word for two weeks.
It was stalemate at home.
Naoki knew what he had to do
(upbeat music)
(sings in foreign language)
Meeting the father
is a big deal in Japan,
especially when you
are the same age.
I'd heard about a Japanese
custom called omiyage,
the giving of a small gift when
you visit someone's house.
I'd brought something with
me to help break the ice.
(upbeat music) (sings
in foreign language)
I've chosen my
omiyage carefully,
something that both appreciate.
- I was thinking of present
to come and to bring you,
can you translate?
(speaks in foreign language)
Chocolates were not appropriate.
After the conversation
we had last time,
I found a really
good gift for you.
(speaks in foreign language)
Special present.
(speaks in foreign language)
- Oh!
- [Sean] He knows already!
(chuckles)
- Thank you, thank you!
- [Sean] The Viagra had
gotten Naoki and Yoshie's dad
talking straight away.
- His, he doesn't work,
like Naoki.
- [Sean] Oh, right, right.
- [Interpreter] This neighbourhood
(murmurs) around here,
his family is very strange.
(laughs)
- [Sean] Why?
- [Interpreter] He
thinks it's important
to make this with the family,
openly talking about--
- Open, open, open.
- [Sean] Family photo, ready?
Now squeeze together!
(speaks in foreign language)
Squeeze together!
(speaks in foreign language)
Say cheese.
- [All] Cheese!
- [Sean] Okay.
- Slippers!
- [Sean] Slippers.
(light cheerful music)
(sings in foreign language)
- [Sean] I was touched
that Yoshie's father
was so accepting.
He even offered to
be my Japanese dad.
In the end, both Naomi and I
had found a family in Japan.
(sings in foreign language)
(cheerful music) (sings
in foreign language)
- [Naoki] This is love.
- [Sean] Is this love?
This must be love.
- Must be love, yeah.
- [Sean] If you're
doing all of this, yeah.
- Love is war.
Love is war.
- [Sean] Yeah.
- [Naoki] Not peace.
- [Sean] Yeah.
- Killing each other.
So I don't like that this way.
I love peace.
So if possible,
I hide continually.
I'm like shadow.
- [Sean] Stay in the shadow.
- Yeah.
But you, you like it,
broken my shadow (chuckles).
- [Sean] Sorry.
I think it's good, though.
Good.
(cheerful music)
(sings in foreign language)
- It's so common trick,
after five, where's the script?
After five years.
Five years is like five years.
It's only two of
those that you plan,
still, the door inside Japan,
getting inside Japan,
the sliding doors of
Japan remain firmly closed.
This track, jog and think
of lines of commentary,
think of ways to film
the film that wasn't happening.
To get out of my hotel room,
to stop getting depressed,
to stop drinking,
to stop taking sleeping pills.
Most days,
I seem to be getting nowhere,
and most nights I just
wanted to fly home.
Now, Grace pushed me away,
taken Ted (mumbles).
'Cause I filmed
them in the hot tub.
Which seemed
completely innocent to me.
And now I've got Naoki.
So, I've started to
film Naoki again.
And I love Naoki.
I'm so happy.
I feel great, left me here,
'cause now I'm
filming Naoki again.
He seemed to be the
only person I was filming
who didn't judge me, who
didn't expect me to be Japanese.
And who didn't mind me making
my stupid British mistakes.
(mumbles) he tell
me privately last night,
he doesn't like British people,
but he likes me, ha!
I'd come to Japan to make a film
about what makes
this crazy place tick,
but two years on,
I'm more confused than ever.
(sings in foreign language)
My mission was to
make a film about Tokyo
for BBC and then HKTV,
but having failed,
I'd come 300 miles north
to a rural town called Yamagata.
Wow, this is tiny street.
This was my last attempt
at getting inside Japan.
I've been told about Naoki,
a person who'd
broken all the rules,
a radical Communist regime
who'd gone on to be a
successful entrepreneur,
but when I met him,
he was working part
time at the post office.
Are you collecting
insurance money?
- Not insurance, fee over there.
Yeah, yeah, insurance money.
I have no insurance (chuckles).
(scooter rumbles)
- [Sean] Hey, slow down!
Slow down!
(sings in foreign language)
Is it okay to take a break?
- It's okay.
- [Sean] Legal?
- I don't know about legal.
But it's natural.
- [Sean] Right.
In a time when it was totally
unacceptable to divorce,
he'd been married three times
and was now struggling
in a relationship
with a girl half his age.
(soft upbeat music)
She wants you to get
a second job, yeah?
- Huh?
- [Sean] Your girlfriend.
- Ah, yeah.
- [Sean] Wants you
to get job number two.
- Yes, she wants.
I'm troublesome for her.
She hates me.
(Sean chuckles)
- [Sean] Do you hate her?
- No, I need her.
- [Sean] Why?
- To survive the
fucking this country.
- [Sean] Now,
he was a breath of fresh air,
a rebel was a rare thing here.
- He was a Maoist.
(laughs)
It's very the extreme people.
You were making bombing.
Put fire,
and threw that overhead.
Because we love baseball,
the underthrow is not so good.
(laughs)
- [Sean] Who were you bombing?
The police?
- No, big company.
- [Sean] Really?
- [Naoki] Yes.
- [Sean] It was rare to be
invited to a Japanese home,
but Naoki wanted to show me his.
He told me to treat carefully,
things were sensitive.
She's asleep.
I was shocked by the
tiny room with no windows
where he'd been living
with his girlfriend Yoshie
for the last five years.
When his last
business went under,
she'd saved him
from being homeless.
But now she'd had to take
a second job to support him.
Their situation
was the last thing
I expected to find in Japan,
the second richest
nation on earth.
(people speak in
foreign language)
Now he was forced to take
the only job he could find,
part time at the Central
Yamagata post office.
Part time here means
working seven hours a day
for just 3.50 pounds an hour.
(bell rings)
Until now,
I felt locked out of Japan,
but naoki was keen
to get me inside.
(light upbeat music)
(speaks in foreign language)
Each day starts at 8:00 a.m.
with early morning exercises.
It was like landing on the moon:
Grown men dancing in suits.
Was this modern high tech Japan?
(speaks in foreign language)
The Japanese view the
workplace as one happy family.
But as a foreigner here,
it didn't feel like home to me.
(light upbeat music)
(speaks in foreign language)
I wondered how Naoki,
a life-long outsider,
would cope with the pressure
of being a part of
this Japanese family.
- It's kind of role playing,
same thing every day.
Some people crazy,
go to hospital.
- [Sean] Really?
- Yeah.
Depress.
- [Sean] Really?
- Yeah, because every
day check from the boss,
Why did you get every day zero?
Every day zero, fuck you!
You are not human!
You are under the animal.
Why?
You are stealing your salary,
every day steal, stolen.
Yeah, depressed,
depressed, depressed.
- [Sean] So they go
to mental hospital?
- Yes.
30,000 people kill themself.
- [Sean] 30,000?
- Yeah, 30,000.
A big shame.
But you gave me this
fucking capitalist system
one hundred years
ago (chuckles).
First the East India company,
and after China, after Japan.
Open the country.
- [Sean] Yeah.
(Naoki chuckles)
And now you're rich.
- Is this rich?
Is military rich?
Is good system?
You gave me.
- [Sean] Sorry.
(Naoki chuckles)
(upbeat, dramatic music)
Just over one hundred years ago,
Japan was a closed country,
until the West forced
it to open its doors
and trade with the
rest of the world.
It was then it adopted
our capitalist system,
that has made it the second
richest nation on earth.
(sings in foreign language)
Naoki ran a number of
successful businesses.
But the economy
collapsed in 1992.
And like thousands of others,
he lost everything.
Now, there's more pressure
on everyone to work harder.
As jobs for life are
no more in Japan,
Naoki took the only
work he could find,
part time collecting
life insurance premiums
for the post office.
He gets paid six times
less than the full timers.
But at least he is free
from having to meet
their daily sales targets.
- I realise it one moment,
they have no good results.
They walk like this.
- [Sean] Do you think
they are successful today?
- They?
No (chuckles).
- [Sean] Why?
- Too early.
(speaks in foreign language)
(scooter rumbles)
I'm free!
(scooter rumbles)
This is Yamagata city.
You can see the
big one building.
- [Sean] Naoki wanted
to show me his hometown
and pointed out the six-bedroom
house where he used to live.
After the family
business went bust,
he fell out with his brother.
He hasn't spoken to him since.
Today,
he has no one left in the city,
except his girlfriend Yoshie.
- Our family, my brother,
me had three houses in the city.
And two company, on, two, thee,
two company, one bar.
And I had a BMW.
I bought the BMW new with cash,
70 million yen.
- [Sean] Do you
remember Naoki's bar?
Is that where you met
Naoki for the first time?
Is that where you met,
in your bar?
(phone ringtone) - So, so.
Customer.
- [Sean] Customer?
- [Sean] I was told
not to make a sound
when Yoshie's clients called up.
To them she was single.
Since Naoki had moved in,
she had to supplement his
income by taking extra jobs.
- Customer believes
she is single.
So every night,
every day they invite
and propose to get to date.
- [Sean] But they
just want to talk
and they just want to eat,
they don't want anything else,
or do they want to--
- Yeah, just to talk and to
eat and sing a song together.
- [Sean] Nothing else?
- Nothing else.
- [Sean] No kissing?
- No kissing.
Sometimes they touch.
Do they have a kiss?
Her boss suggest her, like here.
- [Sean] Keep her legs together.
- Yeah.
This is so polite.
- [Sean] Right.
(speaks in foreign language)
- Everything, you have to
compliment for their customer.
(chuckles)
- Eye shadow (chuckles).
- [Sean] Are you happy?
- [Naoki] I'm busy,
I have no time
to think about the fucking way.
- [Sean] Are you happy
in your first job more
or your second job more?
- [Naoki] Enjoy.
I can be female in night time.
Every nights, every day,
work, work, work
to get money.
It's poverty, our level.
- [Sean] How many
hours working together all,
day job and night job together?
- 15.
- [Sean] Hours?
- Hours a day.
- [Sean] It's tough!
- Yeah, it's capitalism now.
She wants to sleep.
But have to go.
- [Sean] Yoshie
was always nervous
when she was out with Naoki,
in case she was seen with
him by her regular customers.
Where's she going?
- Yeah, you can take a film,
they will meet soon.
- [Sean] So, they're a long way,
they're a long way away,
don't worry.
She'd known this
customer as long as Naoki.
He'd take her for
expensive sushi meals,
and then on to her club,
where she'd be
bought drinks all night.
(soft music)
(sings in foreign language)
In a society where
people find it hard to talk,
I found it strange
to be in a bar,
where Yoshie's job was to talk,
mainly to married men.
The bar,
another room with no windows
felt like a release from a
highly competitive world outside,
where it is totally
acceptable to be drunk
in order to unwind.
(sings in foreign language)
But that must make
you feel terrible.
But how do you keep
the strength to carry on?
- [Interpreter]
Because it's a job.
(hairdryer swooshes)
- [Sean] It seems like a
relentless schedule of work.
After five hours of
sleep they were up again
and off like clockwork.
Naoki makes up for his small
income by being househusband,
a difficult role for a 56-year-old
Japanese man to accept.
Each morning he must
make Yoshie's breakfast
and lunch box before
doing the laundry.
He told me she'd
sometimes tease him
about his poorly paid
job at the post office.
But he had nowhere else to go,
almost totally reliant on her.
I can't help but noticing
there was not physical
contact between them.
Kiss him goodbye.
Kiss.
(chuckles)
Bye-bye. - Bye-bye.
- [Sean] Today Yoshie
works 15 hours in three jobs,
Naoki just seven
hours at the post office,
then back home to do the house
work and get the dinner on.
Do you enjoy being with her?
- I don't want to be homeless
and I need a partner.
- [Sean] She's
stranded you in a way.
- Yeah, she gave me
job (chuckles) to survive.
- [Sean] Do you
think she needs you?
Do you keep her strength?
- Me, maybe I am not confident.
I have not confident to
give her this kind of strength.
- [Sean] Naoki said they'd get
an hour together between jobs
which they'd usually
spend sleeping.
Since starting
at the post office,
he said they'd lost an important
part of their relationship.
- These days I have
no sex (chuckles).
Doesn't work (chuckles).
Broken.
- [Sean] Oh dear me.
- Depressing the mental disease,
like this.
Doesn't work,
my baby (chuckles).
- [Sean] Must be difficult
for you if you're so young,
when he was your age,
he was very active.
- If I have more
kind of stable life,
I can do the sex,
having sex, maybe.
- [Sean] She said
she doesn't need sex.
- She has to say in
front of your camera.
She's young.
But I'm afraid.
Yes, she loves me,
but she needs,
sometimes she needed
a friend of the sex.
I'm afraid, I worry about
having a new boyfriend.
- [Sean] Tried Viagra?
- [Naoki] Yoshie?
No.
- [Sean] So,
you're ready for work?
- I have to go sushi shop.
- [Sean] Soon?
- Soon.
- [Sean] To meet the customer?
- Yes.
He said I envy you.
- [Sean] I don't think so.
Tonight's a busy night?
- No.
- [Sean] Quiet?
- Yes.
- [Sean] What time
are you finishing?
- Twelve.
- [Sean] Okay, see you later.
Have a nice night.
- See you later.
- [Sean] See you later.
Naoki said he'd never
talk so openly with Yoshie.
Normally she
doesn't like to talk.
He said he could never be sure
what she was thinking.
(cars rumble)
- My life, when I have a wife,
I talk, talk, talk.
- [Sean] Really?
- Yeah.
- [Sean] And this life no talk?
- Yoshie dislike the talking.
She told me, Noisy,
shut up, like this.
I love talking.
- [Sean] Why is she
with you do you think?
- I don't know.
I am able to say,
it not my speaking.
Maybe I'm useful.
Maybe she loves me.
But she cannot
allow me my income.
Everyday we have kind of
the stress and struggle, and--
- [Sean] Does she blame you?
- Yes, too much drink every day.
She was tired, she is tired.
Maybe tonight, after drinking,
she became very strong to
express her true mind this time.
(Sean laughs)
- [Yoshie] You.
- Maybe I love her?
- [Sean] Maybe you love her?
- [Naoki] Sleep.
(coins clink)
(speaks in foreign language)
- [Robotic Voice] Compliance.
- [Sean] What's
your favourite word?
- [Robotic Voice] Compliance.
Compliance.
- [Sean] Compliance
to when he touches you
and says, Did you shave today?
- Yes, yes, before,
out of the compliance.
- [Sean] You've got to
be well shaved every day.
- Yes.
I touch here.
Who?
Hi, Mister Sato-san,
you have to shave.
Fuck you, I wanted say,
Fuck you, it's my business.
But I couldn't say.
- [Sean] What did you then say?
- I'm afraid of fire.
- [Sean] What did you say?
- Yes (chuckles).
Yes, man, I will.
- [Sean] Oh dear.
- Yeah, it's miserable.
I'll show you.
(speaks in foreign language)
Broken.
- [Sean] By her.
- You can take this one and
this one and you can repair
and after like this,
different colour.
- [Sean] I was thinking, No, no!
The glasses are expensive,
expensive,
and over 50 (mumbles), like--
(laughs)
- She laughs!
Your fault!
Your fault, you know?
- [Sean] Oh, could you
give me one of those once?
- [Naoki] This one,
no, this one.
- [Sean] Each evening
Yoshie takes her calm down pill,
an antidepressant that
guarantees a good six-hour sleep.
(Yoshie speaks in
foreign language)
How long does it take to work?
She said she wasn't alone.
Many of her friends and
work colleagues do the same.
Within minutes Yoshie
went into a mad eating frenzy.
Naoki seemed to used to it.
He said the pill also
causes memory loss.
She doesn't remember
anything in the morning.
It's a funny situation in here.
- Yeah.
We cannot get the special treat
from government, cannot get.
If we are European,
the nation give me
a kind of a welfare,
kind of a mental.
- [Sean] Psychologists,
psychiatrists support.
- So many supports.
- They don't really exist here,
right?
- Yeah, yeah.
So, firstly,
I have to protect her.
But I'm afraid she
has a kind of disease,
so I can't to separate,
I can't leave her.
Who does look after her?
I'm happy you interview me.
So if possible,
you report all over the world.
This is Japan.
It's a part of Japan.
It's true.
- [Sean] Especially, poor.
- [Naoki] Not special poor.
This is usual poor
in Japan (chuckles).
- [Sean] Japan prided itself
on being the most egalitarian
society in the world.
But the gap
between rich and poor
has never been wider than today.
What happens now?
- The machine
takes out the husk.
- [Sean] Naoki's generation
was part of an economic army
to rebuild this place after
the war, making it rich.
But after the economy
crashed in the early 1990s,
there was no safety net
for the thousands
who became homeless.
Naoki says he would be with them
if it wasn't for Yoshie.
- [Naoki] This is student,
10,000 people.
- [Sean] 10,000?
Occasionally Naoki would
look at a political films,
he'd helped make in the 1960s.
I was surprised by the
scale of protest here.
A riot police.
- [Naoki] Yeah,
this is very strong.
- [Sean] Did the police
come and remove you?
- [Naoki] Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [Sean] Violently?
- Yeah, usually.
- [Sean] Did you hit them?
- Yeah, they hit me.
- [Sean] Did you hit them back?
- So, I'm crazy now (chuckles).
Every night, we had demonstration
with city (mumbles).
- [Sean] But the point
of the demonstration
was to ask the
Americans to go home.
- Yes.
To stop the repair
for Vietnam tank.
- [Sean] Oh, for Vietnam!
This was a stark
contrast to Japan today,
where everyone seems
so scared and obedient.
Allowing me to
film his situation,
seemed to be the only
political act Naoki had left.
- We're terrible poor.
New class, working poor.
- [Sean] I realise,
Naoki and Yoshie
were part of the hidden
underclass, called the new poor.
Yoshie's three jobs net
her 11,000 pounds a year.
Naoki get's less
than half of that.
When it was about survival,
they clearly worked as a team.
But each month Yoshie
would escape to her hometown,
causing tension between them.
- Next Sunday is memorial day
in her hometown.
- [Sean] Oh, next Sunday.
- Next Sunday.
- [Sean] Is she going home?
- Yes.
- [Sean] Should we go?
- No, the family deny me.
- [Sean] Wow.
So we can't go?
- Yeah.
- [Sean] Why the
family deny him?
- I don't know.
(chuckles)
They hate my experiences.
- [Sean] What experiences?
Oh, the divorce?
- So many divorces.
- [Sean] So,
you're a black sheep.
You're like a black sheep.
- Yeah, yeah, yeah.
(bright, upbeat music)
(sings in foreign language)
- [Sean] Yoshie told me why
Naoki feared meeting her father.
Not only was he a
true blue Conservative,
but they were the same age.
She said her parents
knew of their relationship
but preferred not
to mention his name.
- Natto.
- I'll try.
(speaks in foreign language)
Look, he's moved away,
it's dangerous.
- [Sean Voiceover]
The Japanese love
to give foreigners nattos.
It's a traditional dish made
from rotting soya beans.
It was like eating
a big ball of snot.
- Beautiful.
Beautiful.
Beautiful.
(people chuckle)
It felt like I was
sitting in Naoki's place.
It was bizarre they could happily
welcome me, the foreigner,
but not Naoki.
Yoshie was
frustrated with Naoki.
She said his fears
of meeting her family
meant their relationship
would always be on the rocks.
(dog barks)
Yoshie's father didn't speak
to me for most of my visit,
but as I put my camera down,
he asked me a very
strange question.
The price of Viagra in London.
Maybe he and Naoki
have more in common,
than just being the same age.
Thank you very much for having
us, see you next time, yeah?
(speaks in foreign language)
(laughs)
Why did you get jealous.
- Because I need her.
Because here, it's not history,
it's not alive, it's not,
she is my life.
Because maybe,
you know, getting old.
I have no plan to
visit her hometown.
- [Sean] Why?
- I don't know.
It's kind of a decision.
- [Sean] Why?
'Cause I think her
father would accept you.
He's very easy going.
- No.
Your opinion easy, not easy.
Not easy, same age!
- [Sean] It's difficult for you,
but if you want to do it,
you got to do it,
otherwise don't do it.
- No, I cannot.
If I had a daughter,
I would say, Stop,
that's fucking guy (chuckles).
Rubbish.
I knew.
Who can recommend the Naoki?
Nobody can.
Nobody can recommend, get
along together good with Naoki.
Nobody.
- [Sean] Why?
- I don't know.
- [Sean] I do.
- You do, just only you,
you crazy (chuckles).
People hates normally,
people hate anarchism.
People hate the terrorists.
Like that, it's common sense.
- [Sean] You're not a terrorist.
- No (chuckles).
- [Sean] You're not
an anarchist anymore.
- Not anarchist.
- [Sean] You're a postman.
- Yeah (chuckles),
yeah, postman.
Part time.
(clock rings)
- [Sean] This was so far removed
from the workplace
I knew in Britain.
It was like Communism
pretending to be Capitalism.
(speaks in foreign language)
I felt underneath the
surface the fragility
that no one wanted
to acknowledge.
- Someone, he (mumbles),
sweater, he has disease,
disease guy.
- [Sean] Very depressed.
- Depressed.
- [Sean] Is he recovered?
- Maybe now, at the hospital.
He went to hospital, very big.
- [Sean] So he was off
work for a few months.
- Yeah,
something with the medicine.
He gets, sometimes he
doesn't wake up in the morning.
- [Sean] So he never comes in.
- Yeah.
- [Sean] Shit.
(speaks in foreign language)
(soft pensive music)
Naoki told me he'd
been bullied at work too.
He tried talking
to Yoshie about it,
but she was too tired
listening to everyone else.
(soft pensive music)
He introduced me to a workmate
who'd got ill with stress
and would spend
his breaks sleeping.
This man would spend
weekends in the mountains
picking bags of sticky mushrooms
and insist on giving them to us.
(soft pensive music)
As a Japanese saying goes,
the nail that stands out
must be hammered down.
(soft pensive music)
(sighs)
- Tonight we will go
to mushroom man.
Promise.
- [Sean] Oh my God.
- I promised to meet
the mushroom man.
- [Sean] Okay.
Oh, no, more mushrooms!
Does he know it's there?
- Nameko.
- Tell him we started to
call him mushroom man.
(chuckles)
(laughs)
- [Sean] Oh, it's beautiful!
Did you get it in the mountain?
Wow, you picked it.
Oh, wow, wow.
(speaks in foreign language)
- [Naoki] Burned out.
- [Sean] I was
worried about Naoki.
He seemed isolated.
I felt he and Yoshie
were drifting further apart.
- I will stop to argue.
Because I'm afraid
she retaliates.
She has a place to run away.
Her home, hometown.
I have no, just here.
Or she decide to fuck me away.
I have to go.
- [Sean] Where?
- On the road, maybe.
I couldn't borrow.
No bank, no friend, no home.
So this is a way
to go to homeless.
- [Sean] One step to homeless.
- Yeah, it's very near,
my position is very, very close.
- [Sean Voiceover] Naoki
was desperate to talk.
Yoshie was pretending
nothing was wrong.
I knew they'd hardly
spoken a word for two weeks.
It was stalemate at home.
Naoki knew what he had to do
(upbeat music)
(sings in foreign language)
Meeting the father
is a big deal in Japan,
especially when you
are the same age.
I'd heard about a Japanese
custom called omiyage,
the giving of a small gift when
you visit someone's house.
I'd brought something with
me to help break the ice.
(upbeat music) (sings
in foreign language)
I've chosen my
omiyage carefully,
something that both appreciate.
- I was thinking of present
to come and to bring you,
can you translate?
(speaks in foreign language)
Chocolates were not appropriate.
After the conversation
we had last time,
I found a really
good gift for you.
(speaks in foreign language)
Special present.
(speaks in foreign language)
- Oh!
- [Sean] He knows already!
(chuckles)
- Thank you, thank you!
- [Sean] The Viagra had
gotten Naoki and Yoshie's dad
talking straight away.
- His, he doesn't work,
like Naoki.
- [Sean] Oh, right, right.
- [Interpreter] This neighbourhood
(murmurs) around here,
his family is very strange.
(laughs)
- [Sean] Why?
- [Interpreter] He
thinks it's important
to make this with the family,
openly talking about--
- Open, open, open.
- [Sean] Family photo, ready?
Now squeeze together!
(speaks in foreign language)
Squeeze together!
(speaks in foreign language)
Say cheese.
- [All] Cheese!
- [Sean] Okay.
- Slippers!
- [Sean] Slippers.
(light cheerful music)
(sings in foreign language)
- [Sean] I was touched
that Yoshie's father
was so accepting.
He even offered to
be my Japanese dad.
In the end, both Naomi and I
had found a family in Japan.
(sings in foreign language)
(cheerful music) (sings
in foreign language)
- [Naoki] This is love.
- [Sean] Is this love?
This must be love.
- Must be love, yeah.
- [Sean] If you're
doing all of this, yeah.
- Love is war.
Love is war.
- [Sean] Yeah.
- [Naoki] Not peace.
- [Sean] Yeah.
- Killing each other.
So I don't like that this way.
I love peace.
So if possible,
I hide continually.
I'm like shadow.
- [Sean] Stay in the shadow.
- Yeah.
But you, you like it,
broken my shadow (chuckles).
- [Sean] Sorry.
I think it's good, though.
Good.
(cheerful music)
(sings in foreign language)