Endless spasms of purity by aging actor and young woman in modern Tokyo in shadow of Mount Fuji,

Rating: 6/10 (28 February 2014)

We see a beautiful young married woman abandoned by her husband pursuing his own interests in Tokyo and an aging has-been movie star with the sweetest golf swing I've ever seen and an indifferent wife and family in California. Even at age 94 I had no trouble "getting" the message of this slow, relaxing story. But unrealistic sentimentality, at least for me, does not an entertaining movie make. And I do watch an incredible number of movies for entertainment. If I am interested in how other people see the real world, dramatized or analyzed, I read a book. It seems to me that the writer/director did a credible job expressing her purpose, but I'm puzzled why she injected those stupid scenes of the Japanese girl demanding that her stockings be ripped or lipped off and the fast roll in the hay of the man with the singer. And why was the picture given an R rating? These miscues simply ruined an evening of quiet entertainment.