Cinema
Tampopo
タンポポ
Juzo Itami · 1985
Synopsis
Two truckers, Gorō and his young colleague Gun, stop at a roadside ramen shop, the Lai Lai, run by Tampopo, a widow. There Gorō pulls her son Tabo away from comrades who are mistreating him, then fights a brutal customer. He finds her noodles sincere but lacking character, and agrees to teach her the trade, according to Offi and Encyclopedia.com. A small band joins the venture, and the story keeps breaking off for vignettes about food, including those of a man in a white suit.
Context
It is the second feature film of a director who came late to directing, written after the success of the first. The publicity presented it as the first ramen western, playing on the spaghetti western. He produced it with his wife, Miyamoto Nobuko, who plays the role of Tampopo, alongside Yamazaki Tsutomu, Yakusho Kōji and Watanabe Ken. Released in Japan on 23 November 1985, distributed by Tōhō, it was shown in Toronto in 1986 and then in the United States in 1987, where twenty-three critics placed it among the ten films of the year, according to Encyclopedia.com.
Who it is for
One hundred and fourteen minutes, a sketch comedy in which food and desire answer each other, with a few erotic scenes.
Prizes and reception
Praised by American critics, it received two Japan Academy prizes and was restored in 2016, then re-released in France in 2022.