Mitsuko Delivers is fucking dumb. It’s not dumb in a good way, when a movie earns your enjoyment despite obvious failings. It’s not dumb in a bad way, when a movie makes you want to remove your own eyes with a teaspoon. It’s a more neutral shade of dumb, a movie completely oblivious to its own failings. It’s an experience akin to reading an article by a novitiate film critic. You sit and watch and throughout marvel at how these people managed to take themselves seriously, when all that comes from their mouths is infantile gibberish.
Mitsuko Delivers is, unsurprisingly, about a pregnant woman called Mitsuko (Riisa Naka), a penniless, if generous, drifter. Her impregnator, whom she describes as a big black American, dumped her before the movie began. Shunned by society, and kicked out of her apartment, Mitsuko returns to an old home in an ancient poor corner of Tokyo. There she reacquaints herself with a couple of old faces, including the old, lovably-insane landlady Kiyoshi (Miyoko Inagawa) and childhood friend Yoichi (Aoi Nakamura).
Now, the reason I had such a problem with Mitsuko Delivers lies in its horrific misuse of two common tropes of Japanese entertainment. The first of these is the shonen tradition of using personal philosophy as a stand in for personality. This of course results in one-dimensional characters, but that’s not necessarily a problem. If the philosophy is something broad and endearing, the character remains at least likable.
Unfortunately Mitsuko’s personal philosophy is bullshit. Her ambition is to lead a ‘cool’ life, by which she means a life of generosity (fine) that is without appreciation of consequences (supremely annoying). I mean you’d think, with the whole unplanned pregnancy thing, the flaws of such a philosophy would be fairly self-evident. To be brief, not caring about consequences is something only children think is ‘cool’. For everyone over the age of 12, Mitsuko’s beliefs are not so much a philosophy, as an unceasing vacuous spew.
The second problem (to get back on track) is Japanese humour. Now don’t get me wrong. I normally love Japanese humour. As evidence, I cite my recent review of The Woodsman and The Rain, a film that makes excellent use of straight-faced Japanese in ridiculous circumstances. That was humour done right, the equivalent of a man telling you a ridiculous story without seeming to be aware of how ridiculous it is.
Watching Mitsuko Delivers on the other hand, is like listening to a man telling you about, like, how he and his mate Dazza had, like, this totally craaaay-zeee time at a club last night, while you smile and nod, and your eyes begin identifying escape routes. All the stereotypes are present: extreme, over-the-top emotional reactions, random obsessions, behaviour that defies logical human reasoning. In short, Mitsuko Delivers is full of material the filmmakers may have believed to be funny, but which in reality is awkwardly forced.
All in all then, this is not a particularly good movie. It’s not gratingly bad, like Himizu: I’m not sure I can say I ever particularly hated Mitsuko Delivers. Honestly, it never even reached a level deserving of my hate. My feelings towards this dumb-ass movie are best expressed as contempt. If this movie was a person, I’d smile and nod with glassy eyes at everything it said, and then reply with cruel witticisms. Mainly because I’m not the nicest person, but also because I could feel sure that Mitsuko Delivers is so dumb, it would not even realise it was being made fun of.
Adam Brodie
Rating:12AUK Release Date: 11th May 2012
Director: Yûya Ishii
Cast: Riisa Naka, Aoi Nakamura, Ryo Ishibashi
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