A Esposa de Villon

This is quiet little Japanese film about Otani, a writer with a drink habit and a loving, yet long suffering wife, Sachi. He owes money to a bar and so she goes to work there until the debt is paid back, only to realise that not only does she bring the bar business, she also enjoys working. The money gets paid off and she stays on working and earning money, all the while her husband keeps drinking.

Things change however when a young man, a fan of the writer falls for the wife and to add to the story there is a young woman enamored with the writer. Throw in a failed suicide pact and you have quite a drama. Except, despite the potentially heavy story lines, this is handled with a lighter touch. The husband, whilst unfaithful and a drunk actually has some softness to him which makes it difficult to dislike him as clearly the wife thinks. The are brief flashbacks to previous relationships suggesting that perhaps what they have is the best they can have. Because it never become to heavy going, it therefore never becomes emotional and in fact it is quite charming and often funny during much of the film.

The two leads are both very good and the film with it's recreation of postwar Tokyo is excellent. Otani, is in any other world a despicable man,but because Sachi has the will power and strength she really has the upperhand and she makes the choices that bind them. This turns the film from a heavy going melodrama to a lighter one and one that shows that sometimes love does endure.

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