A Housewife Knows: Itami's Supermarket Woman (1996)

 
One of the saddest stories in the world of Japanese film is the end of Itami Juzo, he was a brilliant filmmaker who excelled at comedy but also had the praise and support of critics. However, he was not always a powerhouse director.

He was born, Ikeuchi Yoshihiro on May 15, 1933, to the classic Japanese satirist director Itami Mansaku (wrote Inagaki's The Rickshaw Man '58, directed and wrote The Giant '38 with a young Hara Setsuko). Yoshihiro lost his father at 13. The work of his father challenged and mocked the rigid restraints of society. Mansaku's defiance of social norms carried onto his son who had that biting edge on his own films. Though at 13, Yoshihiro couldn't make films. He was a child after all. College was out of the question, since getting expelled from high school. Working as an illustrator got him to Tokyo which led to a small acting career in 1960 with Daiei films. He changed his name to Itami Juzo to honor his father. That same year, he married his first wife Kawakita Kazuko. It was dissolved 9 years later. Bachelorhood was brief, he met Miyamoto Nobuko. Miyamoto and Itami married later that year. His highlights in his acting career (for me) are Grass Labyrinth (1979) by Terayama Shuji and Lady Snowblood 2: Song of Vengeance (1974).

Directing features came late for him, leading up to that he had directed a short comedy in 1962. That was Rubber Band Pistol aka Gomudeppou. It didn't lead into any directing gigs for awhile. In the meantime, he had created his own production company, Itami Films. At the age of 51, his debut feature film was completed and released. The Funeral burst onto the scene, wowing critics and audiences alike. The Funeral swept the Japanese Academy Awards - Picture of the Year, Director of the Year, Screenplay of the Year, Outstanding Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role, and more. Starting here, he established a groups of that would appear in his films until the end. Tsugawa Masahiko, Miyamoto Nobuko, and Yamazaki Tsutomu are primarily known for their work with Itami.

Going into the 90s, Itami's streak of success continued. A new problem veered into his career and life. The yakuza didn't like how they were portrayed in his films (this is a very brief overview of this messy situation). After the release of Minbo (1992), he was assaulted by gangsters. That didn't stop him. He continued to make films until 1997. Itami was either murdered or killed himself on December 20, 1997.

The master of satire took on many subjects, one of the most fascinating was the world of supermarkets.

Supermarket Woman aka Supa No Onna (1996): Goro (Tsugawa Masahiko) runs the local supermarket, Honest Mart. It was fine until the Discount Demon re-opened nearby with plans to buyout Honest Mart. Several customers leave but barely stays afloat. While spying at the Demon, he runs into his old grade school classmate Hanako (Miyamoto Nobuko). She's a widowed housewife and expert on supermarkets. A housewife knows. Goro hires her to fix up Honest Mart. She completely changes it. It's a success now.

The different factions within Honest Mart warm up to and embrace Hanako. Except for the meat artisans, they don't care for her. Discount Demon has a few inside men to destroy Honest Mart from within. Hanako tries to stop a meat theft by Discount Demon but gets trapped in the back of the freezer truck. Goro gets a neon truck to pursue the inside men from Discount Demon. Hanako is saved. She has an idea for getting cheap fresh fish for New Year's. The sale goes great, credits.

Hanako with Chifu (another Itami regular Takahashi Choei)

Watching this brought up a lot of feelings: sadness and delight particularly. Sadness runs through every aspect of this film but especially when you look at it now. The Miyamoto character, Hanako is a widow. There's a clear reference to Itami's The Last Dance (1993), when Hanako reveals that her husband left her, got cancer, and she took care of him until his death. In several of her husband's films, she plays a widow. Given this came out a year before his death, it adds an unintentional layer of 4th wall breaking melancholy. Tsugawa's Goro is also a widow and has been suffering ever since.

His life is in ruins - apartment's always a mess, empty bottles scattered everywhere, and has completely fallen inwards. He has no one left in his life to care about or care about him. With a failing business, his livelihood is at stake but that doesn't seem to motivate him to change. He's lonely. Hanako has adjusted to life without a husband or a man at all. She's content and very self-assured with who she is and her situation. We aren't informed of the exact details of her life outside of her job but she's very comfortable or as comfortable as she can. She isn't lonely, she's alone.

Ikuyo, Hanako, and another cashier

Goro's failure as a business owner, husband, and a man destroyed his ego. He barely feigns an air of confidence but lacks the spine to even back that up. The meet cute for him and Hanako foreshadows their relationship. While on a barely veiled reconnaissance mission to scope out Discount Demon, the store runs out of an item and lied about a sale. A group of angry housewives, shout at the poor employee and Goro eggs them on. Hanako spins around in a furious manner, punches him in the gut. She takes responsibility and apologizes. The initiative is on her. She's active and he's passive. Every monumental scene with them follows this pattern. She's pushing the business forward whist maintaining the friendship with Goro. He gradually lifts himself from this healthy loving friendship.

If you look this up in some places, it's listed as a romance. The relationship between Goro and Hanako is complicated. He wants to prove himself as a man. This is the closest to a love life in awhile. Throughout the film, he tries again and again to seduce her but she's not into it. After having a cheating husband, men aren't important to her anymore. She can't even have sex with him, even for fun's sake. Him trying to be masculine is funny to her. Goro's fragile ego can't handle it but after realizing how important she is to the business, things change. The meat thievery chase at the end could feel like the damsel in distress trope but it's subverted in that patented Itami fashion. Hanako again initiates the action but gets caught by her own fault. Goro propels himself into saving her. He finally feels like a man.

Post-rescue the first thing on her mind is how to outdo Discount Demon yet again. He's continually in awe of her intelligence and savvy. However, in the rescue (we don't see this) he had to give her a bath when she was passed out. This doesn't feel creepy at all. Their on-screen chemistry is so real and good-natured that this possibility is out of the question. They've filled that empty void in their lives for each other. She voluntarily lets him in. A proper romance could develop but it's unlikely. She very pointedly mentions that if she becomes his woman, the employees will not see her for who she is anymore (this also feels vaguely meta given, she was married to Itami). They'll think of her as an opportunist. The romance gets subverted into the hijinks into the business of running a supermarket.

Goro and Hanako

Aside from the veiled reference to 1993's The Last Dance, there are very strong connections to Tampopo and A Taxing Woman. In Tampopo, Tsugawa had a small important role as...the supermarket manager, who is trying to catch a pervy elderly woman groping all the food before closing. It's absurdly funny like that film. In a sense, you could say that Goro is that grocery store manager a decade older. However, there's another commonality...Food. Tampopo explored our relationship with the preparation of and consumption of food but not where most of us get it. Supermarket Woman takes things a step back and looks into the culture of a supermarket, where they get their food, how they get their food, why they get their food, the management of a supermarket, the different departments of a supermarket, and the relationship between the customer and the supermarket. This sounds very lofty and boring. 

It isn't. 

The ultimate goal is to have the best customer service in all of Japan not the biggest or most profitable supermarket. Miyamoto's Hanako is reminiscent of her character from A Taxing Woman, Ryoko. She's up against the greed of shitty men who don't care who they fuck over with the Discount Demon here and Gondo in A Taxing Woman. They provoked that fire inside her and unleashed a demon. On top of that, she's great at her job with a hard-nosed persistence. Ryoko's an identical character (even down to fashion and haircut) except she's a tax inspector. 

Itami Juzo with a Cat

Itami yet again shows the process of how a job is done but it never comes off as dull or false. It's wonderfully constructed and arranged, thanks to the wonderful editor Suzuki Akira (Suzuki Seijun's regular editor). All of this under the guise of a romance, in a very organic, funny way. As always, it's fucking delightful. If someone were to watch this and not at least find it delightful or any Itami at that, I would question their taste in film.