The old school tie is strong for many Japanese, especially members of the dwindling prewar generation.
Reunions of classmates, from elementary school on up, are a common, often serious theme in Japanese films, far more so than in Hollywood pics, where they are occasions for comic one- upmanship or pay-back. Characters who wax sentimental about these get-togethers are shown up as idiots, asses or some combination thereof.
Why the difference? Seijiro Koyama's nostalgic drama "Hokushin Naname ni Sasu Tokoro (The Place Where the North Star Lies Low in the Sky)" offers clues. Based on a true story, it revolves around the 100th-year anniversary in 2001 of the baseball club of Number Seven High School (now Kagoshima University) in Kagoshima Prefecture.