When I taught at colleges here in the 1980s, I marveled at my students' freedom, including freedom from study. They could spend most of their waking hours at part-time jobs or club activities and still, somehow, graduate.
But, as Shinya Tamada's ensemble drama, "Lust in a Karaoke Box," shows with the persuasiveness of deep familiarity, this carefree existence has its downsides — and is not as unfettered as it looks from the outside.
Based on a play that Tamada wrote and in 2016 staged with his own theater troupe, this debut feature premiered in the Japanese Cinema Splash section of last year's Tokyo International Film Festival. It left without a prize but reminded me of films by Kenji Yamauchi ("At the Terrace") and Daisuke Miura ("Love's Whirlpool") — both directors with theatrical backgrounds who knowingly examine the inner workings of groups in action, from sly sexual innuendo to raw emotional revelations (which are not necessarily far apart).
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