Tokyo Love Story
東京ラブストーリー
The Moonlight essay
CinemaTokyo Love Story and Why Love Cannot Always Choose the Same FutureRead the essayStoryline
The whole story, ending included.
'Let's have sex,' Rika Akana tells Kanchi, and her directness reset what a heroine could say in 1991.
Kanji Nagao, twenty-four, comes to Tokyo from Ehime to join a sporting-goods company, Heart Sports, and is met at the airport by a colleague, Rika Akana, who grew up partly in Los Angeles and says exactly what she thinks. In Tokyo he meets his two school friends from home again: Satomi Sekiguchi, a kindergarten teacher he has loved since high school, and Ken'ichi Mikami, a medical student who plays around. At a class reunion Kanji sees Satomi kiss Mikami. Rika tells Kanji she likes him and keeps turning up at his side. Satomi, unable to decide, starts seeing Mikami; Rika invites Kanji to have sex with her, and they spend the night together. She calls him Kanchi and teases him about Satomi, and after quarrels and reconciliations they become a couple the whole office knows about.
When Mikami and Satomi break up, Rika sends Kanji to Satomi herself. She has quietly applied for a transfer to the Los Angeles office, and is hurt that Kanji does not try to stop her. She tells him again that she loves him and arranges to meet him that night; Satomi asks him not to go. Kanji chooses Satomi and ends it with Rika, who vanishes. Remembering that she wanted to see his home town, Kanji goes to Ehime and finds her at his old primary school. After he shows her round, she tells him she is leaving for Los Angeles and will wait at the station in case he changes his mind. He runs to the station, but she has caught an earlier train. On the fence she has tied a handkerchief: Bye bye Kanchi. On the train she cries over a school photograph she took from his room.
Mikami's girlfriend Naoko walks out of her arranged marriage on her honeymoon and goes back to him. Three years later Kanji, now married to Satomi, attends Mikami and Naoko's wedding. On the way home the couple run into Rika, who left the Los Angeles office after six months and is back in Tokyo. Kanji and Rika talk for a while. She tells him she treasures having loved him, and as they part she calls out his nickname one last time.
Starring
Honami Suzukias Rika Akana
A frank, free-spirited colleague who grew up partly in Los Angeles and loves Kanji openly, without hiding what she wants.
Rika Akana’s story
Rika meets Kanji at the airport and soon tells him she likes him; before he arrived she had an affair with their married boss, Waga. When Satomi chooses Mikami, Rika invites Kanji to have sex with her, calls him Kanchi, teases him about Satomi and becomes his girlfriend in front of the whole office. When Satomi and Mikami split, she sends Kanji to Satomi herself, and applies for a transfer to Los Angeles, hurt that he does not stop her. On the night she waits for him, he chooses Satomi. She vanishes to his home town in Ehime, where he finds her; she says she will wait at the station, then takes an earlier train, leaving a handkerchief on the fence: Bye bye Kanchi. Three years later, back in Tokyo, she tells him she treasures having loved him.
Yuji Odaas Kanji Nagao
An indecisive young salesman newly arrived from Ehime, torn between Rika and his high-school love Satomi.
Kanji Nagao’s story
After a first job at home, Kanji comes to Tokyo, where Rika meets him at the airport. He has loved Satomi since high school; at the reunion he sees her kiss Mikami, tells her how he feels, and she cannot decide. When she chooses Mikami, he spends the night with Rika and, after quarrels, becomes her boyfriend. When Satomi and Mikami split, Rika sends him to Satomi, and he does not stop Rika's transfer to Los Angeles. On the night Rika waits for him, Satomi asks him not to go, and he stays. He finds Rika at his old school in Ehime, shows her his town and reaches the station too late, finding only her handkerchief. Three years later, married to Satomi, he meets Rika on the way home from Mikami's wedding, and she calls his nickname one last time.
Narimi Arimorias Satomi Sekiguchi
Kanji's gentle high-school friend, a kindergarten teacher who leans on others and cannot choose between Kanji and Mikami.
Satomi Sekiguchi’s story
Satomi was bullied at school because her family ran a love hotel, and she has always believed it was Kanji who scrubbed the graffiti from her desk. At the reunion she kisses Mikami, hesitates when Kanji tells her he loves her, and chooses Mikami, moving in with him. When she sees Mikami embracing Naoko, she calls Kanji to talk it over, and after she and Mikami part she turns to Kanji again, though he is now with Rika. On the night he is to meet Rika, she comes to his flat with home-made oden and asks him not to go, and he stays. Three years later she is married to Kanji. On the way home from Mikami and Naoko's wedding, the couple run into Rika, and Kanji and Rika talk for a while.
Yosuke Eguchias Ken'ichi Mikami
Kanji's childhood friend, a medical student who skips classes and chases women, and gives better advice than he takes.
Akiho Sendoas Naoko Nagasaki
Mikami's university classmate, a rich doctor's daughter promised to another man, who runs back to Mikami.
Tokuma Nishiokaas Natsuki Waga
Kanji's married boss, who had an affair with Rika before Kanji arrived and still looks out for her.
Why it matters
Tokyo Love Story is about a woman who says what she wants, and what that costs her. Rika asks for sex, for time and for love out loud, in 1991, and the drama was built around her: the screenwriter, Yuji Sakamoto, proposed telling the manga's story from her side, and the director spoke of an aesthetic of losing beautifully. Against her stands Satomi, gentle, domestic and dependent, whom some viewers mocked as the oden woman after she arrives at Kanji's flat with home-made food. The series averaged a rating of 22.9 per cent and reached 32.3 per cent with its last episode; the staff received more than 300 letters asking them not to make Rika unhappy, and the actress who played Satomi received threats. It is credited with making Monday at nine a television institution. What it leaves open is whether Kanji chose the wrong woman or only the easier one.