Keishi Otomo’s “The Legend & Butterfly,” which was made to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the Toei studio, looks like the sort of big-budget Japanese period drama that too often calls up adjectives like “dull” and “turgid.”
Based on a script by Ryota Kosawa, however, the film scraps the usual explanatory narration that brings back memories of soporific history classes — a daring choice for a mass-audience epic that clips through three decades in the complex lives of its two protagonists: warlord Oda Nobunaga (Takuya Kimura) and his wife, Nohime (Haruka Ayase).
Instead, it focuses on the pair’s relationship while brushing past much of what transpires around them, from clan wars to Nobunaga’s children by his various concubines. (Nohime was childless, though the film mentions a miscarriage.)
This will probably present little problem to Japanese viewers of the film since much of what it depicts has been told and retold in countless novels, TV dramas and movies. They know the outlines, even if details are missing.
The film also heavily fictionalizes Nobunaga and Nohime’s marriage, about which little is known. But by stressing the legend, rather than leaning on skimpy and disputed facts, the film brings a fresh, feminist perspective to its story.
It begins with the couple’s political marriage in 1549, with a young Nobunaga suspecting that his sharp-tongued and formidably intelligent bride is a spy for her father, the lord of the neighboring Mino domain whose nickname is “The Viper.”
Heir to the Owari domain in what is now western Aichi Prefecture, Nobunaga is proud and arrogant, but also eccentric, yukking it up with clownish retainers and dressing in flashy-but-sloppy garb. Not surprisingly, Nohime regards him as a thick-headed fool. In scenes played for laughs, she also bests him as an archer and saves him from falling off a cliff. His respect for her grows, if not yet his affection.
A turning point comes in 1560 when Nobunaga, now the lord of Owari, is confronted with an invading army many times the size of his own. Just when he is on the point of committing seppuku (ritual suicide), Nohime proposes a battle plan and even an inspirational address to his troops. Her suggestions turn out to be brilliant and Nobunaga realizes that his prickly wife has her uses.
The film then downshifts from this fast-paced and entertaining start to Nobunaga’s long, blood-soaked quest to destroy his enemies and unify Japan, with the years and big-scale battle scenes blinking by. Along the way, Nobunaga and Nohime finally connect romantically over the course of an eventful day spent walking around town in disguise to experience “normal” life, and their story begins to follow a conventional romantic drama course.
Playing the grim-faced, middle-aged Nobunaga, Kimura is almost unrecognizable from his heyday as a member of the superstar pop idol group SMAP, but his heartthrob charisma still shines through and keeps the character from becoming completely hateful. A bigger revelation is Ayase as Nohime. Once known for her roles as chipper, wide-eyed ingenues, Ayase dominates the screen with everything from the fierceness of her royal glare to the fineness of her comic timing.
By the end of this 168-minute film, however, I was feeling in need of a refresher course in the Warring States era. Perhaps “The Legend & Butterfly” should have been a streaming series, with more context for the historically challenged. But not, please, another dull, turgid TV costume drama.
| Rating | |
|---|---|
| Run Time | 168 mins. |
| Language | Japanese |
| Opens | Jan. 27 |
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