Brief Story Line
Ubukata (Ryo Yoshizawa - Kingdom, Tokyo Revengers movies etc) was working as butler in a large cruise ship under Captain Yabuchi (Yoh Yoshida - Hero, Flying Colors TV series etc). In their latest journey, there were plenty of passengers like the Kuruma family that consisted of the father Dr. Sohei (Hatsunori Hasegawa), his son Michihiko (Ken Yasuda) & his wife Misaki (Saki Takaoka) and their daughter Rena (Rumika Oogai).
Aside from them, there were also the snobby Aina (Rinko Kikuchi - Pacific Rim Uprising, Tokyo Vice TV series etc) and her partner Shintaro (Kento Nagayama - Love Like the Falling Petals etc) who always looked down on another couple Ryuki (Yuki Izumisawa) and Shiori (Aju Makita). As the crew tried to maintain high standard of services to the passengers, Ubukata's work was disturbed with the appearance of Chizuru (Aoi Miyazaki - Nana, Virgin Snow etc) whose intention was not clear at first.
Things suddenly became complicated when Ubukata witnessed a murder. So how would the story conclude? You could find out in this movie.
End of Brief Story Line
I actually had high hopes of this movie as I thought it would be an entertaining whodunit murder mystery story in a confined space. The teaser trailer also seemed to promise some comedy which should add joy to the movie. However, the opening scene did not exactly give aura of excitement as Ubukata seemed to have too low self esteem and did not inspire confidence as lead character. But as the story progressed with more characters appearing, the film became more fun as they gave more color.
After some long exchanges of the characters involved, we finally got to see the murder happened which made me a bit disappointed at first, since it seemed very straight forward. But the subsequent event proved otherwise and made me intrigued. The movie continued with mystery solving that was combined with some drama and romance where the romance took more screen time while the comedy was too little. Only towards the end that the focus shifted again to the mystery and I was glad that at least there was some twist that surprised me, although I should have noticed it if I was more concentrating earlier.
Since I have not watched that many Japanese movies/series, only few people that I was familiar with here (I think my wife would have more knowledge of them). I was quite satisfied with them in general and felt they performed their roles adequately, but there was nobody that truly impressed me. In addition to the names I mentioned above, the movie was filled with several support characters like the maid Mrs. Sakumoto (Nahana) & her son Kanato (Yunho), the magician (Takashi Okabe) and few others.
What I liked about this movie was the nostalgic feeling I had when seeing the cruise as it reminded me of the delightful time I experienced with my wife few years ago. It was fun looking at the activities and culinary adventures on the cruise ship (murder exempted obviously). Unfortunately for me, the rom-com element was not properly balanced with the murder mystery plot and made me less entertained. It's a good thing the twist was there to make me more satisfied. Btw, the film had duration of 2 hours 5 minutes which felt long and did not have any mid or post end credit scene. It was directed by Yusuke Taki (Ms. Sherlock TV series, Girl Gun Lady etc) and written by Yuji Sakamoto whose credit included critically acclaimed 2023 movie titled Monster.
Overall this movie was quite OK, but since the mystery did not seem to be focused enough and instead emphasizing more on the romance, I was personally not that satisfied. It was something that might not entertain hard core fans of murder mystery but those hoping for romance probably would be happy. So if you just want to have a bit of fun watching this kind of story, you could give this Netflix original movie a try.
Mike's movie moments rating: 3 out of 5 stars
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