Love and Fortune

I guess my review will give the same feedback as many others here, cause I have the same feeling of many reviewers: why the hell is he 15? Why did the screenscript writers choose the ML to be 15? There is nothing okay about that?! With 18 there is a huge age difference as well and she would be struggling with the same doubts, so the story line would not have been different as from what the ML and FL are dealing with. And as a viewer I wouldn't feel awkward about him being 15. It's a waste cause so would have liked it more.

Anyhow, the series develops in a very realistic way, it's no romantic "we-are-on-cloud-nine"-story.

Imagine the storyline where the sexes are flipped. In other words, the lead character is a 30-something male, bored with life with a steady girlfriend, who decides to have a fling with a female high schooler. I'm not sure which culture would find this premise acceptable.

But for some reason, as long as the lead character is female, then it's OK and we go into a fantasy storyline.

As depicted in the story, the female lead is just bored of the mundane life she's leading and so goes looking for a hot, underaged pickup. Again, imagine if this was a male lead--any sympathies then?

Then we get into the psychologies of the various characters. I cannot fathom how the 30-something female lead acts like a 30 year old. She's more like a stunted 20 year old. Unhappy with life, she is not able to talk with her boyfriend about their relationship issues and instead decides to have a fling. Doesn't this sound more like what a high schooler or college couple would do?

As with many J-dramas these days, the original story came from a manga series that's geared towards young female audiences. Hence the main female lead feels like a 20 year old.

J-dramas in my experience always mean some sort of cliché-adhering, trope-involving affairs, mixing romantic themes and coming-of-age themes, etc., that moset of the time barely make it above the cut.

This show however really struck me as departing from all of that and honestly presenting a premise of: what if a 30y+ old girl got "stuck" in her relationship that seemed to not go nowhere and met someone who's 15y old and made all her life feelings in question? It's naive and dramatic on so many levels, starting with the age gap, but sadly if you're like me you can relate to the dimension of being older and seemingly all the sparks of life are diluted into nothingness and though you're not even 40 you feel like you're dead... SO... this one premise really moves you.

Together with all this, the cinematography on this show is WAY above average. In many of the multiple 25 min episodes I felt like I was watching a masterpiece movie from a respected cinematographer - this never happens on an american TV show. It's a TV series that feels like a succession of very good quality indie movies with great taste.

It may start as just another japanese romantic show but it's incredibly WAY more deeper than that. So many things nowadays purport to be "feminist", whatever that means. Besides all that I've written above, this show has got to be one of few times I felt something true about that. Highly recommended.

Found it on Netflix. Interesting! The concept is good. Age is just number when it comes to love. And There's no point in staying with someone if you are bored or have no lust/love.

.... still tho, they skipped all the steps and jumped to oral without even holding hands or kissing ?? A bit too much for an Asian movie. Well may be I am just not that used to R21 movie.

A thirty two year old woman who works in a movie theatre finds a high schooler asleep one day and finds herself attracted to him. She is stuck in a mundane relationship with a salary man who plays video games all night and seems uninterested in their future. She begins an affair with the young boy which raises the question that if two people love each other does it matter about the age difference. Even though the boy looks older then fifteen I still found it uncomfortable to watch, although it does show well the different outlooks on life each one has at their different ages.