The struggles of comics, be they up-and-coming or down-and-out, is a popular theme in Japanese film and television. A recent example of this was "Hibana," a 10-part original Netflix drama about the decade-long career arc of a manzai (comic duo) act.
A similar concept is present in the scrappy comedy "Laughing Lucky Cats" ("Warau Maneki-Neko"), based on Yukihisa Yamamoto's 2004 novel about a female manzai duo. Ken Iizuka's film version comes out April 29, following the completion of a four-part drama starring the same characters — played by Fumika Shimizu and Rena Matsui — on the MBS and TBS networks, which began airing last month.
The producers of this project are neither lucky nor laughing since their star Shimizu announced her retirement from show business in February to devote herself to the Happy Science cult. But even if Shimizu had resisted the allure of a higher calling, she couldn't have saved this film from its scattershot plotting and frenetic dramatics.