Hirugao: Love Affairs in the Afternoon
昼顔〜平日午後3時の恋人たち〜
The Moonlight essay
CinemaHirugao and the Only Unscheduled Hour in a LifeRead the essayStoryline
The whole story, ending included.
Housewives who love in the afternoon; the drama that popularised hirugao, the Japanese title of Belle de Jour, as a word for the daytime affair.
Sawa Sasamoto, thirty-one, lives in a small flat in Yokohama with her husband, Shunsuke, and works part-time at a supermarket to save for a house. Their marriage is gentle and sexless, and her mother-in-law blames her for the child that has not come. One afternoon Sawa pockets a lipstick on impulse, and Rikako Takigawa, a rich, beautiful neighbour who meets men from a dating site on weekday afternoons, sees her do it and uses her as an alibi. The two become friends of a kind. Through a schoolboy's car break-in, Sawa meets his form teacher, Yuichiro Kitano, an unassuming biology teacher whose wife, Noriko, is a rising scientist. Against her own resolve, Sawa becomes his lover. Rikako falls in love with Osamu Kato, a struggling painter, and leaves her family to support him by working as a hostess.
Noriko uncovers the affair and pretends to be pregnant. Sawa and Kitano run away together, and their families track them down and drag them back. At a lawyer's office Kitano calls the affair a game, Sawa says she was killing time, and both sign a pledge never to meet again. Unable to stop herself, Sawa sets fire to her own home, hoping the law will hold her back; Shunsuke tells the police it was an accident, then asks for a divorce. A fight with Rikako's jealous former lover leaves Kato unable to paint with his right hand, and he sends her home to her daughters. On the day Sawa leaves home alone, the lorry carrying Kitano and Noriko to their new home passes her in the street, and she does not see it.
The 2017 film begins three years later. Sawa, divorced, works at a restaurant in a seaside town where no one knows her, and sees Kitano's name on a poster for a talk about fireflies. They meet again, keep to the pledge for a while, then begin to live together, and Noriko agrees to a divorce. On the day she hands Kitano the papers, she drives him to the station, tells him that her recent injury came from an attempt to take her own life, and drives the car into a barrier. Kitano is killed. Noriko survives and tells Sawa she will hate her for ever. In her grief Sawa comes close to ending her own life, turns back, and learns she is carrying Kitano's child. Years later, children playing in the woods find the ring he had hidden for her.
Starring
Aya Uetoas Sawa Sasamoto
A quiet part-time supermarket worker in a sexless marriage, who falls into a love affair she knows she should not have.
Sawa Sasamoto’s story
Sawa pockets a lipstick, and Rikako, who sees it, makes her an alibi and a friend. Through a schoolboy's car break-in she meets his teacher, Kitano, and against her resolve becomes his lover. She runs away with him, is dragged home, calls the affair killing time and signs a pledge to stay apart; then she sets fire to her own home, hoping the law will hold her back, and Shunsuke asks for a divorce. In the film, three years on, she is working in a seaside town and meets Kitano again at a talk about fireflies. They keep the pledge for a while, then live together, and Noriko agrees to divorce. Noriko crashes her car with Kitano in it, and he is killed. Sawa comes close to ending her own life, turns back and finds she is carrying his child.
Takumi Saitoas Yuichiro Kitano
An unassuming high-school biology teacher, married to a more successful scientist, who falls in love with Sawa.
Yuichiro Kitano’s story
Kitano feels small beside his wife Noriko's career. Meeting Sawa through a pupil's car break-in, he soon thinks of leaving his marriage for her. Noriko pretends to be pregnant; he and Sawa run away and are brought back, and before a lawyer he calls the affair a game and signs the pledge. Three years later, giving a talk about fireflies in a seaside town, he sees Sawa in the audience. They meet in the woods without touching until Noriko finds them; he promises Sawa to do it properly this time and moves in with her, and Noriko agrees to divorce. He hides a ring for Sawa in the woods. The day he collects the papers, Noriko, driving him to the station, tells him her injury was an attempt to take her own life, and crashes the car. He is killed.
Michiko Kichiseas Rikako Takigawa
A wealthy, beautiful wife and mother who takes lovers on weekday afternoons, until she falls in love with one of them.
Rikako Takigawa’s story
Rikako has the new house, the editor-in-chief husband and two daughters at private school, and meets men from a dating site under the name Hirugao. When her lover's car is broken into, she grabs Sawa for an alibi, and later tells her that marriage trades passion for peace. She drops that lover; later he lures her to a hotel room under a false profile and tries to attack her, but Kato bursts in to save her. Kato, a proud, penniless painter, has already painted her at her own party, and he becomes more than a game: she leaves home and works as a hostess to keep him. When a fight with her former lover leaves Kato unable to use his right hand, he sends her back to her daughters, and she returns to her family.
Kazuki Kitamuraas Osamu Kato
A proud, penniless painter who draws Rikako and becomes the one lover she cannot treat as a game.
Ayumi Itoas Noriko Kitano
Kitano's wife, a brilliant molecular biologist and indifferent housekeeper, who will do anything to keep her husband.
Kosuke Suzukias Shunsuke Sasamoto
Sawa's husband, a kind, fastidious furniture-company employee who loves her but no longer sleeps with her.
Why it matters
Hirugao is about the loneliness inside ordinary marriages: a husband who is kind and does not touch his wife, a mother-in-law who blames her for the missing child, a rich wife who is admired and unseen. Its title borrows a phrase for wives who take lovers on weekday afternoons, which the network's own daytime show had featured as a trend and which comes from the Japanese title of Belle de Jour, and the drama made it famous: it was among the nominees for the 2014 buzzword of the year. It treats desire as real without pretending it is free. When the series ended with every affair broken off, viewers split between those who found the ending honest and those who felt it had lost its nerve; the film answered with a death. What it leaves is Sawa's closing confession, half apology and half warning: that she may one day anger God again.