Jun Yokoyama has been playing hooky. When his mother, Michiko Kuwano, finds out, she asks him why. He won't tell her: it's because she's a bar girl at a hotel, and the other children shun him.
Hiroshi Shimizu's movie is split interestingly between the adult world and the child's world. The world of children has its own pecking order, and subtle rules that maintain its structure, punctuated by fights. The adult world also has its rankings, ad the lovely Miss Kuwano is at the bottom of the pile, unable to even quit her ill-paying job. Yet the adult world has absolute control over the world of children, and is quick to seek out signs that something threatens its own order.
As he grew in reputation and autonomy, Shimizu would become more and more interested in the problems of children; here, he resorts to a big finish to elicit a strong audience reaction. Even so, his handling of his juvenile actors is superb.
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