Title: スマイル Sumairu (Smile)
English Title: Smile
Country: Japan
Language: Japanese
Year: 2009
Episode: 11
Cast:
- 松本潤 Matsumoto Jun
- 新垣結衣 Aragaki Yui
- 中井貴一 Nakai Kīchi
- 小池栄子 Koike Eiko
- 前田吟 Maeda Gin
- いしだあゆみ Ishida Ayumi
- 勝村政信 Katsumura Masanobu
- 小栗旬 Oguri Shun
- 吉沢悠 Yoshizawa Hisashi
SYNOPSIS
Hayakawa Vito is born from a Filipino father and a Japanese mother. Although he was born and raised in Japan, he continuously encounters discrimination for being a half-foreigner. Vito dreams of putting up his own restaurant in the future and he works hard to realize this dream.
Vito meets Mishima Hana one day, a high school girl with a beautiful smile. She used to speak when she was younger but she lost her ability to do so due to an accident. Hana communicates through sign language and gestures.
Vito was wrongly accused of a crime and his friends enlist the help of Ito Kazuma, a successful lawyer, to defend Vito in court. Unfortunately, biases and prejudices of most people may make it hard to prove Vito's innocence.
REVIEW
Smile was very difficult to watch because it shows how biases and prejudices affect people's judgment. The setting for the drama is Japan and the characters are Japanese, but these situations happen everywhere.
To an extent, this drama was especially hard for me to watch because I'm a Filipino. Some people would actually say that situations in the drama are exaggerated for entertainment purposes but these situations actually reflect reality.
Hayakawa Vito always smiles although he experiences a lot of hardships. This is a characteristic that Filipinos are well-known for and I don't know if the writer included this characteristic in Vito's personality as an attribute to his being half-Filipino.
This drama did not do well in Japan ratings-wise but I really commend everyone involved in the drama for providing an opportunity to raise discrimination issues. The drama creates awareness, which hopefully leads to discussion of these issues in the society, if not right now then possibly in the near future.
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スマイル Smile
