A Movie You Might Have Missed #80 — Shall We Dance? (1996, Japan)

It's been 12 years since I began this series highlighting movies I wished more people knew about. I'm rerunning it from the beginning because I still think these are movies you might have missed.

Passion is about to find two unlikely partners.

A middle-aged Japanese businessman’s dull life takes an interesting turn when he signs up for a ballroom dance class just to meet the beautiful instructor. But he keeps the lessons secret because in Japan ballroom dancing —where you hold a stranger closely in public — is considered perverted.

Meanwhile, his wife feels the changes in the behavior of her happier husband, and hires a private eye to investigate whether he is having an affair.

This charming and funny movie gives foreigners real insight into Japanese life in the city and suburbs and the cultural restraints that everyone must live with daily in modern life. It isn't really about dancing or romance so much as it is about social commentary on several levels, albeit with a light hand.

When you dance you’re exposing your inner self. You are out there for the world to see. This has so much potential for embarrassment. You have to ignore that if you want to enjoy what you’re attempting. You have to allow yourself to trust or you don’t get the full experience in living — to varying degrees everyone in the movie makes that connection.

I originally watched this in 1997 with an intern fresh from Japan who had seen it twice already. She was surprised at some of the places the American audience laughed and had to ask why some things were funny. Clearly the director had a good understanding of both Japanese and English speaking audiences to be able to hit both so accurately!

NOTE

Scott and I discussed this on episode 105 of A Good Story is Hard to Find.