In the boom years of the 1980s, most Japanese — the often-quoted figure was 90% — identified as middle class. Meanwhile, Japan's prewar aristocracy had seemingly vanished from the face of the Earth.

Today, as Yukiko Sode’s “Aristocrats” shows with precision and insight, the Japanese upper class continues to rule the top rungs of business, politics and society, its byways only dimly glimpsed by those below.

Based on a Mariko Yamauchi novel of the same name, “Aristocrats” is the rare recent Japanese film that focuses on the yawning gap between the masses and the classes — that is, the folks from privileged backgrounds who hop on the escalator to a top-flight university in kindergarten and, if they are women, need not bother with anything as vulgar as a career.