Swing Girls (2004)

Director:

Shinobu Yaguchi

Writers:

Shinobu Yaguchi (written by)
Junko Yaguchi (contributing writer)

Release Date:

17 March 2005 (Singapore)

Genre:

Drama | Comedy | Music

Tagline:

Girls meet Jazz!!!

Plot:

Plot Keywords:

High School Band | Mushrooming | Musical Contest | Saxophonist | Self Motivation

Awards:

11 wins & 2 nominations

Cast

Juri Ueno	...	Tomoko Suzuki
Yûta Hiraoka	...	Takuo Nakamura
Shihori Kanjiya	...	Yoshie Saito
Yuika Motokariya	...	Kaori Sekiguchi
Yukari Toyoshima	...	Naomi Tanaka
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Nagisa Abe	...	Reiko Shimoda
Noriko Eguchi	...	Shop Assistant at Muscial Instruments Shop
Hana Kino	...	Manager at supermarket
Fumiyo Kohinata	...	Yasumi Suzuki
Fumiko Mizuta	...	Yuka Yamamoto
Naomi Nishida	...	Masumi - student at music school
Mutsuko Sakura	...	Suzuki Mie (Tomoko's Grandmother)
Miho Shiraishi	...	Yayoi Itami
Issei Takahashi	...	Band Leader
Masaaki Takarai	...	Kubota-sensei
Naoto Takenaka	...	Tadahiko Ozawa (math teacher)
Yoji Tanaka	...	Manager of Pinball Parlour
Kei Tani	...	Morishita
Eriko Watanabe	...	Sanae Suzuki
Asuka Yamaguchi	...	Chika Kubo

Runtime:

Japan:105 min

Country:

Japan

Language:

Japanese

Color:

Color

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

Hong Kong:I | South Korea:12 (re-rating) | South Korea:15 (original rating) | Singapore:PG

Filming Locations:

Yamagata, Japan

Company:

Altamira Pictures Inc.

Trivia:

The video game that Tomoko's sister is playing in the house scene is called Space Channel 5 Part 2 for the Playstation 2. The second song the Swing Girls play during the concert is the main theme from the game. The song is called Mexican Flyer by Ken Woodman.

Quotes:

Nakamura, Yuta: Where do you think you're going?
Tomoko Suzuki: Bathroom.
Nakamura, Yuta: Liar! You really have to practice. There's only a week left 'til the game!
Tomoko Suzuki: Won't even let us pee!

Soundtrack:

In the Mood

One of My Favorite Films

The characters of Swing Girls are low motivated female high school students taking summer classes. They decide to start playing musical instruments and aim at taking part in a high school band competition. Their performance at the end of the movie is cheered wildly by the audience of actors and by us, the film viewers.

The director of this film is Fumihareu Yaguchi, known most widely for his work on Water Boys, a film about a male high school synchronized swimming team. There are some points in common between these films: the characters are under-motivated teenagers; friendship plays an important role; and the characters learn to achieve a difficult goal.

There are two good points and one weak point to Swing Girls. Overall the casting was excellent. The actresses succeed in portraying youth, seriousness, and pleasure and you can feel the strong tie of friendship between them. The music played in this film is traditional and familiar to many, such as Sing Sing Sing, which we often hear on TV in Japan. But one thing that seems to have been omitted are the scenes of the hard practice to the road to progress. The girls improve too suddenly.