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One Million Yen Girl (2008) Movie Review: A Beautiful Slice of Life Movie

Hello, everyone! It's been a while and I'm struggling to write reviews consistently but let's hope I can do better this month💪🏻🥹

So, One Million Yen is about Suzuko Sato (Yu Aoi) who has been released from a prison because of a small thing which actually is not even her fault. Struggling to fit in, especially with family and people around whispering stuffs about her, she decides that she will make one million yen and moves to another city. 

Official Poster

Title: One Million Yen Girl
Another Title: One Million Yen and the Nigamushi Woman; Hyakuman-en to Nigamushi Onna
Native Title: 百万円と苦虫女
Screenwriter & Director: Yuki Tanada
Genres: Adventure, Life, Romance, Drama
Release Date: July 19, 2008
Duration: 2 hours and 1 minute
Casts: Yu Aoi, Ryusei Sato, Mirai Moriyama, Taki Pierre, etc.

We follow Suzuko's adventure from town to town (not exactly a town, since she also moves to a rural area in Japan, I hope you get what I mean). City near the beach, a village which is famous for producing peaches, a small city. Suzuko makes one million yen, and moves when her saving hits exactly at that number, and nothing can stop her from leaving. She avoids having a deep relationship with people, avoids romance, anything that makes her feel attached to the place she's living in that time. It makes the viewers wonder, why does she do that?



I love this movie. This is the kind of movie that makes you appreciate slow, calming lifestyle, but makes you think about life at the same time. The movie that seems light, but also has depth in it. It's very beautiful. 


One Million Yen Girl also presents how society sees an ex-prisoner, without giving attention to the backstory of why she/he can get imprisoned. Once you are being imprisoned, then it means you're a bad person. Just take a loot at Suzuko. She has done nothing wrong, but the society blames her, mocks her. It shows us how ugly the society is.



The cinematography is also very beautiful. The tone is rather gloomy, but it still shows the beauty of Suzuko's daily routines and it still captures the beautiful scenery of the places Suzuko has visited.


Yu Aoi is an amazing actress. I watch her other movies and she is very versatile. She has this look in her eyes that embodies the character very well. Applause for her👏🏻👏🏻

Yu Aoi as Suzuko Sato

Overall, I really enjoyed this movie and recommend it to any of you who's looking for a movie with amazing cinematography and acting, plus great life lessons. I give this one 4,5/5⭐️ have you guys watched this movie?

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