噢，露西！

节子的生活过得一团糟，家里象是垃圾站，每天上班打不起精神来，对同事和上级爱搭不理，对马上退休的内勤阿姨冷嘲热讽。总之，节子是个对生活毫无兴趣的人，节子四十多了还单身，她就是那种人，我不知道您的生活中有没有这样的人，简言之可称之为“情痴”的人吧。她的生活在她年轻时男友被姐姐抢去后，出现了断崖。爱情的失去，让她对生存的兴趣落到最低点。我有个大学同学，也是这样的，她更惨，大学时一场情变，让她的精神世界出现颠覆，虽然后来有过短暂的婚姻，但后来还是神经出了问题，她堕入了精神世界的无间道。节子是这样的人，说好听的，为爱情活着。后来，她的生活出现了大的转折点，她遇到了外甥女的男朋友，英语老师，美国人约翰。她在与约翰在课堂上的例行拥抱里发现，她又找到了爱情。或许还有对姐姐的报复心态，即便她知道这个年轻又帅帅的男人是外甥女的男友，她还是主动与之发生了性关系，并且在手臂上纹上了与约翰相同的图案：汉字“爱”。并且她毫不掩饰的对外甥女全盘托出。她没想到的是，外甥女那么刚强，在海边一头跳了崖。象是节子在地铁碰到的另一个年轻人，一头撞向了疾驰而来的地铁。结局是改良性的，原本以为节子无法在这样一场甚至象是事故的爱情破灭后不能全身以退。她吃了很多药，试图自杀，但是英语课上的男同学森出场救了他。他成不了取代约翰的备胎，在真正的爱情里是不存在备胎的，真正的爱情中，另外一个人是无法被替代的。但是，真正的爱情，是生命中不可承受之重。因为爱情太脆弱，因为人性太难捉摸。森只是一个陌生的有温暖的怀抱，与爱情完全不同意味与感觉的拥抱。略胜于无吧，这个世界很冰冷，指望用爱情去燃烧，只能幻灭。

「我把刺青除掉了」谁会为了刚有了感觉的人飞到美国去呢，并且还会刺一个和他一样的刺青。或许我会坚持到的登机的时刻，当在飞机上颠簸的时间里，我会清醒。刺青，当然只会为我自己，延续长久的事情。四十多岁疯狂的女子，在自己的情绪到来的时候不会克制，被同事排挤，所爱的男人飞回美国之时情绪失控，毁了一位同事的离职聚会。遇到喜欢的人不懂克制，拥抱当作爱，泄欲当成托付，想说的就说，最后一败涂地，同时没了所谓的亲情爱情。不过还好，电影最后有愿意接盘她的男人。现实就不一定了。本来当是浪漫喜剧，没想到这么沉重。开头便是男子的卧轨自杀，之后是女主侄女在受刺激后的跳海。最后女主吃了很多安眠药，但是那个老实的男人救回了他。都会有这种人出现吗？奥，露西

Lauded Japanese-American female filmmaker Atsuko Hirayanagi’s feature debut, OH LUCY!, derived from her own eponymous short, is a USA-Japan coproduction starring Shinobu Terajima as Setsuko, a Tokyo-dwelling, 40-something unwed, childless office lady (a kindred spirit of Kumiko in David Zellner’s KUMIKO, THE TREASURE HUNTER, 2014), whose benumbed workaday existence is shunted into a new lane when she enrolls in an English class for beginners, welcomed by the open-handed warmth generated from the American teacher John (Hartnett, still handsome enough to conquer lonely-hearts), and christened with a new English name Lucy and sporting a blond wig, Setsuko instantly cottons to John, soon, jolted by the latter’s unheralded departure with her niece Mika Ogawa (Kutsuna), she sets out a journey to the southern California to seek him out, on the pretense of the familial ties, and accompanied by her sister, Mika’s mother Ayako (Minami). Setsuko/Lucy’s plight denotes the honest-to-good cliché of spinsterhood’s stigma which is so entrenched in our society’s mindset. Disparaged both in working places and within her own family, Setsuko is a hardened victim out of such chronic, collective mental abuse. She is bluff enough to debunk the hypocrisy to a retired colleague in her farewell party, despite that she is unable to dodge the grim fate of superseding the latter as the new anathema in the office, the canker never stops spewing its invisible virulence. Plus, the drawn-out grudge between her and Ayako goes a long way back to the fact that Ayako has stolen the man she loves and started a family with him, which makes the relationship between Setsuko and Mika an increasingly complicated one, and Hirayanagi deftly channels out the toxicity with an unexpected turn of event in this otherwise light-hearted indie charmer coruscated with dry humor and straight-faced confrontations, often borne out of the milieu’s yawning cultural disparity (cutesy maid cafe versus nameless motel, suppressed subsistence versus laidback shiftlessness), though nothing particularly novel and we all know the drill by now (the sight of a deer materializing apropos of nothing is simply too blasé to elicit any other deeper feelings). Having no qualms about neither shucking off the last fig leaf of the mythologized allure of an occidental foreigner, nor delving into the rock bottom of a self-seeking woman’s despair, eventually OH LUCY! lends on its feet with a positive vibe in that “I’m not the only one” revelation, imparted by Kôji Yakusho’s unpretentious mannerism, to offer a scintilla of optimism in Setsuko/Lucy’s never-ending jeremiad, superbly reified by Terajima’s leading performance which mingles utterly unfeigned spontaneity, perpetually miffed bemusement with ineffably understated sorrow that gives this pleasurable gem a winning if slight edge over the umpteen similar offerings infesting the niche art-film market. referential entry: David Zellner’s KUMIKO, THE TREASURE HUNTER (2014, 6.8/10).