Posted: 10/17/2004

Shall We Dance?

(2004)

by Coco Delgado

“In Japan, ballroom dance is regarded with much suspicion. In a country where married couples don’t go out arm in arm, much less say “I love you” out loud…intuitive understanding is everything. The idea that a husband and wife should embrace and dance in front of others is beyond embarrassing. However, to go out dancing with someone else would be misunderstood and prove more shameful. Nonetheless, even for Japanese people, there is a secret wonder…about the joys that dance can bring.”

These lines are spoken (and subtitled) in the opening scenes of the 1996 Japanese movie Shall We Dansu?, a clever study of Japanese social mores, the interaction of men and women, and the consequences of following an uncommon passion, a film which, for some incomprehensible reason, Miramax has seen a need to translate and revamp for Americans, in a remake named Shall We Dance?.

Never mind that the “scandal” of a middle-aged husband and father wanting to do something different, let alone ballroom dance with women not his wife, is completely removed from the American version. Never mind that they’ve randomly cast big name actors to play the lead roles, whether they really fit them or not. Never mind that apart from a few minor details, this version’s script is at times almost verbatim and many scenes are virtually identical to the original…

No. Wait. Let’s actually mind that last bit. This remake is basically the same movie with white people (and a black guy) in Chicago (the only American city that can really replicate the bored city worker seeing the pretty girl in the dance studio window) instead of Japanese in Tokyo. Some scenes are identical. Many lines are word for word from the original’s subtitles. And the changes they’ve made? Not so good.

In the Japanese film, Mr. Sugiyama is a bored accountant worker bee with a desk in a large office. He has just managed to purchase a modest home for his wife (a housewife) and teenage daughter in the city. They have a small car, and he rides his bike to the train station to get to work.

In the American version, Mr. Clark is a hot-shot Chicago lawyer with a large office. His wife also has a thriving career downtown at Marshall Fields. He has a teenage daughter and a college-aged son, who really only matters in one scene. They live somewhere in the suburbs in a huge house surrounded by a perfect lawn and drive an SUV. So already we’re at something of a loss…he’s got a lot more going for him than Mr. Sugiyama.

But he still takes the train into work…so we can have a movie, at least.

There are some “Americanizations” here: His wife has a career, we have the whole “you dance so you must be a ” subtext, and there’s a sappy romantic ending involving a red rose. But beyond that…? It’s the same movie! Even Stanley Tucci as the dork by day, Latin lover by day balding coworker is really only imitating the character of Mr. Aoki; his visual joke is nowhere near as funny as the original, however. The joke is that the Japanese Mr. Aoki imitating a famous Latin competitive dancer looks ridiculous with his clothes and wig, but Tucci’s Link Peterson looks almost believable in a similar get-up.

It’s especially painful to watch this remake and hear the audience laugh at the jokes and know that they are the same funny lines they were in Japanese, and the crowd thinks the wrong people were so witty and clever to have written them.

Seriously. Shall We Dansu? was scheduled to come out on DVD on October 12, but the release date was mysteriously pushed out into November. Find the VHS, wait for the DVD…but do yourself a favour and see the original.

Heaven help us if the Hollywood machine decides to remake Tampopo…

Coco Delgado is a raconteur currently lighting up the aisles all over Boston.

Got a problem? E-mail us at filmmonthly@gmail.com