SFIAAFF: The Great Happiness Space: Tales Of An Osaka Love Thief

Ever since we read SFist Mihi's review of Great Happiness Space: Tales of an Osaka Love Thief (we'll abbreviate that GHS:TOLT) from last year's DocFest, we've totally wanted to see this documentary, about brilliantly-coiffed Japanese men who are paid to socialize with women in local bars, in a reverse of the infamous "hostess bars" of Japanese fame. Lucky for us it came back to town as part of the SF Int'l Asian-Am film fest!

As SFist Mihi so wisely put it in her review, "Don't hate the player, hate the game." As we got totally caught up in the Cruel Intentions-like mind games between the host men and the troubled women they service, we ended up completely confused about who's the cat and who's the mouse, and concluded that everyone in the movie is psychotic.

It's hard to say who's fooling whom, and who's onto the joke -- which we suppose was probably the point. Plus, the interactions get so complicated that midway through the movie you start thinking you need to start writing things down in baseball-scoring notation.

SFist Mihi's way funnier than we are, so read her review for the plot summary (and spoilers) in the movie -- we'll just add that the screening was packed with people, all of whom we were eyeing suspiciously when the lights went back up in the theater (Is that person into this movie as a joke? Or is that person a little too into the movie?), and that before the screening, they announced that GHS:TOLT had won the "Best Non-Distributed Movie" award for 2006 (technically, it's called the "Best Movie Not Playing In A Theater Near You" award). Dude, that's not an award you want to win!

GHS:TOLT plays again on Friday in Berkeley (rush tickets only) and Sunday in San Jose.