Fifth about The Seventh

Plan 75

Plan 75: perhaps the gentlest of the dystopian movies, Hayakawa Chie’s drama may also be one that punches the hardest. It tells how the government had an idea of how to deal with an aging society; no one said it was a good one, as it involves the voluntary euthanasy of the elderly as a systematic solution. The film looks at a few different characters: an elderly and lonely lady that is struggling to make ends meet, a foreign caregiver that has her own familial reasons to work in the program, and a solicitous, respectful salesman of the eponymous plan. Acting is quite delicate: Baishoo Chieko is very touching as the still active and healthy but abandoned lady; Stefanie Arianne and Isomura Hayato are effective as the other two protagonists; Yuumi Kawai has a short but devastating scene as yet another worker. Cinematographer Urata Hideho shoots the film with a tight focus, giving a lot of intimacy to the story.

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