The Family Game (家族ゲーム, Kazoku Geemu^?) is a Japanese movie that was directed by Yoshimitsu Morita in 1983. The movie portrays the changing dynamics of Japanese family life around the time. It focuses on a dysfunctional middle-class nuclear family—each family member is connected not internally, but through the social roles they are expected to take on, and the pressure of these social expectations further accelerates the breakdown in their communication. The Family Game received several awards including the best movie of the year as selected by Japanese critics. Although the movie missed the Japan Academy Prize for the Best Picture (losing out to The Ballad of Narayama), Ichirōta Miyagawa was awarded Newcomer of the Year.

[edit] Plot summary

The Family Game presents an exaggerated look of the family structure in 1980s Japan, through the Numata family. The Numata family consists of the father, Kōsuke (Juzo Itami); mother, Chikako (Saori Yuki); and two sons, Shinichi (Jyunichi Tujita) and Shigeyuki (Ichirōta Miyagawa). Shigeyuki is a junior high school student who will soon be taking a high school entrance examination. Unlike the high school student brother, Shinichi, who lives up to Kōsuke’s expectations, Shigeyuki’s grades are consistently poor. So the typical white-collar workaholic father finds a private tutor, Yoshimoto (Yusaku Matsuda), for Shigeyuki and imposes all responsibilities for his exam on the tutor. Even though Yoshimoto is a seventh year student of a third-rate university, Shigeyuki’s marks become better and better. This movie explores not only dysfunctional families and competitive educational problems, but other issues prevailing in Japan in the 1980s.

[edit] Cast

• Yusaku Matsuda as Katsu Yoshimoto
• Juzo Itami as Kōsuke Numata
• Saori Yuki as Chikako Numata
• Ichirōta Miyagawa as Shigeyuki Numata
• Junichi Tsujita as Shinichi Numata, the older brother

[edit] External links

• Kazoku Gēmu at the Internet Movie Database