Fortune Favors Lady Nikuko review

Conventional roles are muddied in director Ayumu Watanabe’s (Children of the Sea, Space Brothers #0) Fortune Favors Lady Nikuko. Nikuko has lived a capricious life. Impulsively fallen for different men, she’s moved in with them, before inevitably ending up supporting them financially. She’s also a confidently corpulent woman with a voracious appetite. Nikuko doesn’t just consume cuts of beef or french toast but devours them like a ravenous wolf. But not everyone shares Nikuko’s fondness for wordplay (her own name includes terms for “meat” and “child”), and her awkward attempts at humor often silence the room.

Perhaps as a reaction to her mother’s gregarious personality, daughter Kikuko is far less outgoing. When her mother is exhausted from working as a waitress at a local restaurant, Kikuko cooks and cares for Nikuko, sporadically undertaking a parental role. Tomboyish and concerned with how others view her, Kikuko is occasionally embarrassed by her mom’s brash behavior. While watching Fortune Favors Lady Nikuko, it’s difficult to not reflect on the uneasy behaviors of our own parents, and how their conduct might have shaped our own dispositions.

Beyond flashbacks that show Nikuko living with a street vendor in Toyko, the majority of Fortune’s 97-minute running time centers around the pair’s life in a northern fishing town that resembles Onagawa or Urashuku. There’s a decidedly Ghibli-esque appreciation for the pastoral, with the film basking in the beauty of an isolated shrine, vibrant fields intersected by canals, and a brief respite at summer matsuri. Occasionally, the film flirts with magical realism, with the town shrine, as well as birds flying overhead, seemingly communicating with Kikuko.

Periodically, Fortune focuses on exquisite details of rustic life. Kikuko repeatedly lays on the floor of the boat that Nikuko’s boss lets the mother-and-daughter pair sleep on, her head next to a glass window where fish dart by. Kikuko becomes enamored with a local boy named Ninomiya. He expresses his feelings through exaggerated facial expressions when he thinks no one is looking. After developing a friendship with Kikuko, Ninomiya shows her an isolated vantage point that overlooks the entire village. Not only is the scene aesthetically gorgeous, but it evokes the feeling of youthful discovery, witnessing awe-inspiring splendor before it has become routine.

Then there’s the food. When Kikuko makes french toast or spaghetti for her fatigued mother, the film oggles the raw ingredients as well as the mouth-watering culmination. Back at the restaurant, tender cuts of steak are seared over traditional yakiniku grills, framed in shots fitting for a commercial. Entertainingly, Fortune Favors Lady Nikuko isn’t afraid of referencing other animated works with the film offering a comical nod to one of My Neighbor Totoro’s iconic scenes.

There’s a relaxing tempo that accompanies the slice-of-life depiction of Nikuko and Kikuko’s relationship. Smartly, the film avoids any kind of hyperbolic villainy, with attention fixed at day-to-day conflict.  At school, Kikuko is asked to take a side between two acquaintances. Outside, she finds comfort in Ninomiya’s companionship. Smartly, Watanabe never explicitly tells the audience, but we wonder if the young boys attempt to conceal his feelings is a refuge from the unrestrained emotions of Nikuko. Yes, a third-act reveal threatens the mother-daughter bond. But the handling of the dilemma is realistic and offers a resolution that avoids being too tidy or conflicts with the tone leading up to that moment.

Fortune Favors Lady Nikuko is a muted success for showing the intricacy of relationships. You’ve probably seen countless depictions of fairy tale-like bonds between mother and daughter. But Studio 4°C’s film strives for a more realistic, and ultimately more resonant portrayal of the intermittently complicated human bond.

Fortune Favors Lady Nikuko is now available for purchase
and digital rental on Blu-ray/DVD and streaming services.