Oh Lucy!

This week, a movie you might have missed. Oh Lucy is a Japanese/American production released in 2017. Written and directed by Atsuko Hirayanagi, the film blends very culturally specific Japanese and American elements to make a weird, sweet, unique film.

 Shinobu Terajima stars as Setsuko, a quirky, lonely office drone working in Tokyo. She chain-smokes, distains her co-workers, is estranged from her only sister, and holes up in her tiny apartment that’s overflowing with hoarded junk. She doesn’t seem unhappy, per se, but she sure doesn’t seem fulfilled either. Out of the blue, her niece, the daughter of Setsuko’s estranged sister, contacts her asking for a favor. The niece has already paid for a series of English lessons that she no longer needs, and she’s hoping her aunt will buy out her remaining lessons. Setsuko agrees out of affection for this daughter she never had and her only accomplice in holding a grudge against her sister.

The English lessons end up being taught by John, played by former heartthrob it boy, Josh Hartnett. Encouraging her to immerse herself in American culture, John immediately takes Setsuko into a long, warm hug, and then gives her a blonde wig and a new American name: Lucy. Setsuko is so taken aback by this handsome stranger who insists on hugging her, she goes along with his ridiculous methods. She meets another of his students, a man who has taken on the name of Tom, and is very much looking forward to more lessons until she finds out that John has abruptly quit and returned to America.

Setsuko figures out that her niece and John are lovers and left for the states together. She contacts her sister, explains the situation, and together the two of them head for America, partly to retrieve family, partly to find out what happened to the man Setsuko unexpectedly fell for.

The tension between Setsuko and her sister walks the line between hiliarity and profound discomfort. We discover that her sister stole Setsuko’s boyfriend back in the day and married him. It’s the hurtful, sometimes hilarious secret that hangs over the two women.

The uncomfortable combination of humor and pathos pretty much sums up the whole film. At first, it comes across as a quirky, lonely hearts comedy, but it takes surprisingly visceral, melodramatic, sometimes explicit turns. There are several unexpected moments that made me laugh out loud, but the tone veers pretty wildly in the second half of the film. What begins as a lighthearted comedy takes a rough turn when her niece tries to commit suicide, her sister cuts her off again, John rejects her advances completely, and upon returning home, she loses her job. The turn is unexpected but not unwelcome. It gives the film more heft and resonance than your average romcom.

Terajima as Setsuko is wonderful. Her character is earthy and snarky, but she has a twitching vulnerability and self-destructiveness underneath. Her bemusement with and attraction for John are palpable, but it’s also apparent that it’s more about a longing for something meaningful and human in her life than it is about her handsome English teacher. Your heart breaks for her when everything falls apart at the end because both her warmth and her dysfunction feel so real.

The other surprise here is Hartnett. Having gone off the A-list radar for several years now, he’s popping up in smaller, independent projects like this one. His character is affable but more complex than his California slacker persona suggests, and his frustration with his muddled romantic situation is palpable.

Oh Lucy isn’t like any other film you’re likely to see, and that’s a big part of the pleasure. It’s unexpected, but it’s not just quirk for quirk’s sake. Grounded by Terajima and Hartnett and fueled by a warm empathy for a broad range of flawed characters, it’s a funny, sometimes sad film that ends on a hopeful note. It’s worth seeing, and it’s available on streaming now.