Complete credited cast: | |||
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Katsuya Kobayashi | ... | Katsuhiko Kobayashi |
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Mitsuko Baishô | ... | Saeko Kobayashi |
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Yoshiki Arizono | ... | Masaki Kobayashi |
Yûki Kudô | ... | Erika Kobayashi (as Kudou Yuuki) | |
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Hitoshi Ueki | ... | Yasukune Kobayashi |
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Kazuhiko Kishino | ||
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Toyoko Koumi | ||
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Akira Ogata | ||
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Iwao Hayashizaki | ||
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Nobuhiro Gomori | ||
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Yoshinori Inoue | ||
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Hirona Takahashi | ||
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Kunihiro Ide | ||
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Alex Ablamov |
The Kobayashi family finally get the chance to move out of their tiny, cramped Tokyo apartment in favour of the suburban house of their dreams. But all is not well: the house is infested by termites and the family starts cracking up: Son Masaki is studying so obsessively for his exams that he's losing his mind; daughter Erika is oblivious of all but her forthcoming record company audition, grandfather Yasukuni starts getting World War II flashbacks and father Katsuhiko is so worried about his family's "sickness" that he thinks can only be cured by group suicide... Written by Michael Brooke <michael@everyman.demon.co.uk>
This is a brilliant film which pushes its initial set-up -- middle-class Japanese family moves into new house and finds out there is not enough space -- just as far as it can possibly go. Along the way, every dark fear one might ever have harbored about family life is thoroughly confirmed. "The Crazy Family" had a successful 1984 theatrical run in the US (at least, it played in New York City for several months) but for some reason has never been released to any form of video in America. Some enterprising company should remedy this situation ASAP.