Kazoku geemu (The Family Game)

• Japan 1983, 107 min.

Director:

• MORITA Yoshimitsu

Starring:

• MATSUDA Yusaku
• ITAMI Juzo

Notes:

• One of the major concerns of an ordinary Japanese family today is the school entrance examination children have to undergo. Admission to a good high school boasting a high passing rate on the entrance examinations to top-ranked universities is presumed to mean a bright future. Thus, in many cases, parents get more frantic than the children themselves who actually have to take entrance exams, and hire a private tutor for them or send them to cramming schools. But, such imposition form parents becomes a torture to less academically gifted children, who grow the feeling of resentment that may trigger a great family tragedy.
  

• While catching a glimpse from the so-called "examination hell", the Family Game does not take up this educational rat-race situation as a grave and serious matter. Instead, the film has been made into a unique comedy brilliantly focusing on the numerous laughs an eccentric tutor brings in the ordinary household. Especially, the highly acclaimed meal scene in which all the family members eat sitting in a row at one side of the table proves the unique sense and originality of MORITA Yoshimitsu, a director of great promise in his early 30's.