'A Taxing Woman' - Movie Review

Ryōko Itakura (Nobuko Miyamoto) is a tax auditor - a very good one. We see her daily business of catching tax evaders. She has a shot at Hideki Gondō, the owner of a string of love hotels ... but fails, as he's a true master of tax evasion. Still, the two of them form a bond of respect. Later, after she's promoted to tax inspector (evidently a higher rank than "auditor"), her team has a go at Gondō again.

This is ... a comedy? I see the word "satire" at Rotten Tomatoes, and maybe that's closer. I have a good friend who puts this down as one of his favourite movies ever, and I think he sees it as a comedy. It has some big laughs, but I found them to be fairly far apart. I think this is in part me missing and/or not understanding Japanese humour. It's not much of a drama ... I mostly enjoyed it, but I still don't know how to file it.

A note about the subtitles: it was interesting to see love hotels referred to as "adult hotels" in the subs, and likewise Pachinko parlours were called "Pinball parlours." These days it would make more sense to use the latter terms as most North Americans know them, rather than the ones that may have made sense in 1988 when this made its way to VHS tape ...