Sweet and Simple

Movie: Hula Girls

My Rating: 3 stars

This is the last of the films I saw as a trailer on the Linda Linda Linda DVD.  It took me so long to get around to it because it actually too a while for it to be release in the United States.  There are actually a lot of Japanese films that I’m still waiting on.  So, I was glad to finally get my hands on this one.  The movie has a pretty sweet, charming story.  It’s set in a remote, northern, mining village in Japan that has been experiencing some pretty hard times.  The local politicians think that if the town can drum up some tourism dollars, maybe they can turn the people’s fortunes around.  So, they’ve struck upon the idea of creating a “Hawaiian Cultural Center” in the middle of town to bring a touch of the exotic to this wintry region.

The main problem is that not everyone in town is on board.  First of all, creating this center will take a lot of money—money that some miners believe could be used to improve the poor quality of life in town, or the crumbling infrastructure.  (Especially since there is no guarantee that the tourists will even start showing up once the attraction is ready).  Second, these are pretty conservative people, so they aren’t exactly thrilled at the idea of their teen daughters shaking their hips in those skimpy Hawaiian skirts in front of strangers.  And, they sure don’t approve of that uppity, Tokyo tart that the mayor has hired to teach their innocent daughters her lewd arts.  She’s a professional dancer who is in charge of getting the girls ready for their promotional tour, but teaching in this Podunk town isn’t really where she wanted her career to be at this point in her life.  The film follows her efforts to whip these uncoordinated girls into performance shape, and to help bring some joy to this downtrodden town.

This is a pretty good movie.  It stars lots of great actors, and has a cute, little story.  Although, the movie does come off as a little single-dimensional and clichéd at points.  I’ve grown accustomed to a certain amount of humor or self-awareness in films, so this sentimental, somewhat sappy movie seemed a little alien to me at first.  I had totally forgotten that was what all feel-good movies used to be like.  Still, I’m really glad I watched this movie finally.  I have liked just about all this films from this studio, and I’ll definitely check out all the films they suggest in the future.