Chonmage Purin (2010)

Also known as: A boy and his Samurai
Country: Japan
Genre: family, food, historic
Format: movie
Cast: Nishikido Ryo, Fuku Suzuki, Tomosaka Rie, Sato Hitomi, Kutsuna Shiori, Horibe Keisuke, Inoue Jun, Nakamura Yuji, Konno Hiroki
Synopsis: Kijima Yasube is a samurai from Edo Period. He goes through time-slip and ends up in nowadays Tokyo. He meets Hiroko and her son Tomoya. Yasube finds it hard to manage by himself in Tokyo and he starts to live with Hiroko and Tomoya, in return he does the housework as Hiroko is divorced and has a stressful work, which makes her unable to do the housework at the same time. Yasube starts to make pastries, which are new to him. The 3 of them grow really close, but everything has its end.
Rating: 4/5
 A really really great movie. Actually I did not hope much from it, so it definitely beat my expectations.

Nishikido Ryo played the part of Kijima Yasube. He suited for that role perfectly! Nishikido Ryo was  like Yasube had to be - tough by appearance and words, but sweet and gentle inside. What is amazing, is that Nishikido-san actually took 2 months of baking classes just for this role. He himself has said that in reality he hates all kind of sweets. Besides, seeing Nishikido Ryo with children makes me fall for him =D  I loved Yasube's character - he had amazing learning ability and Gyoza sake! he was soooo good! His learning ability kinda looked too amazing, so that it already crossed the line - the movie does not show much of his failures or hard times (oke, there was the one time with vacuum cleaner, but still) - I believe that even I won't get used to living in Tokyo with that time as he did (I know - he still was Japanese and stuff) and I am living in 21st century! His adaption with year 2010 was too quick.

His hair looked hilarious when it was apart, but thank Gyoza, it was just a wig for all the movie. Still it looked funny. Especially the "Kappa-scene" lol. I liked how Yasube kept his old manners too - all this samurai's respect and acts. It looked cool and confident. May be he was a little bit too confident in himself at times, so I loved 100% when for a second he gets a rebound and then achieves the same confidence again.
Hiroko, at the same time, was totally 21st century woman - direct opposite to Edo Period beliefs, which seemed normal to Yasube. I liked that Hiroko was more work-oriented and very confident in herself even though she was a single mother. I do not think that she was a bad mother, because it must be hard to bring up a son alone. With her lifestyle I understand why she was unable to make proper food or house works. She was 8 years older than Yasube. I liked that she put Yasube into awkward positions with her acts and words. I did not see much emotions of love. Same goes to Yasube, but it more looked like they did not even had that kind of scene to show these! (That's the reason why it did not get 5 stars) In Hiroko role was Tomosaka Rie  and I liked her pretty much - she is not like the classic beauty and that works for her. She really looked like a woman who tries to succeed in life, has had very difficult situations in her life etc.

The little dude was cute =D (I know - all little children are adorable, but still). It was amazing how he was able to cry. It looked believable. Tomoya character seemed like a normal child for that age - all this Pokemon stuff and so on. The thing that is most common for children is to cry and laugh on and off - it might look like he gets over things really fast, but actually that is how the children of that age are. I think that Tomoya was the character, who brings the movie down to earth, when the time slip is abnormal.

The thing I loved most about the movie, was that it showed the differences of older generations and nowadays one (If I may say so). Even though many of old beliefs do not take place in 21th century big countries (I mean developed North countries - I have no idea what is the right word for that in the economical concept), like women must stay at home and raise children, while men bring in the money. (Even though I would like to be a house-mom in future, I still would like to remain some of my own financial resources) - no woman likes to spend her husband's money for her shopping and beauty treatments and if the married couple divorces, then the woman has still her income to manage with life. But I think that old rules like showing respect to others who are older, especially to your parents, and that parents have to call to order their children and must make then clear how to act - should be in nowadays life too. I feel like there are so many young people and even small children, who are really rude and have no social ability to act normal - maybe it is rude of me, but I mostly think that the problems lay in their upbringing. 

The thing I did not liked at all was that I did not understand the time flow - it definitely did not seem that he had been there for months when it came out that he had. I really thought til then that it was maybe 3 weeks! And the thing that they actually took it really easily that he came from Edo Period through time slip - things like that happen everyday, ne? Beside, no-one ever thought of his ID?? He had no proves to identify himself - no birth certificate or ID etc. and even when he became famous, no-one really thought who he is? where he is from? Weird, but I hope that normal viewers do not start to think about this stuff.
The end of the movie is pretty good =D In some way it is totally neutral end, but it works for this movie.
It is a very sweet movie mixed with beliefs of different time periods and people (not to mention those super yummy cakes shown in the scenes!!!). I strongly recommend it, you can even get some little knowing of Edo Period - who knows, may be someone gets a strong interest for Edo Period from this.

SPOILER review: I hope you noticed this, but towards end Yasube asks the same thing from Hiroko, what asked Hiroko's ex-husband - to give up on working and stay at home. This was the reason why Hiroko told him to leave. There are women who worhship their work and feel that working gives them a measure of indepentency - that does not mean that they love their family less than home-mothers. I find that disappearing point very wierd - I mean the outcome of the scene was weird. You could totally see how it was made with computer! At first, it more looks like he **** on ground, so the ground gets wetter. Sorry, but it really looked so for a minute xD I just did not like that fake computer effect and their poses, but it still was a sad scene, even though it was a little bit predictable thing to happen. But the kiss-scene was rather unpretictable, but on the other hand it was quick and there did not seem to be much emotions. Yasube was not an enchanted frog, who you kiss when you want to break the curse. But it seemed like it was exactly what Hiroko thought when she kissed him in this kind of situation. (but at the same time - we all would have done it :D )
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Sorry for being away for so long. Last three weeks have been really hectic and I went to holidays too - which btw was amazing. I actually felt that I am going crazy, because I had not watched anything for a while. So I have not had any time to write reviews too. For last days I have been studying for like 24/7 and my sleep time has been 4-6 hours per night. I am afraid that my crazy time might stay until 17th December O.o, but I really try to end with it this weekend. I hope you can forgive me just a long break and not fulfilling my promise to write sooner.