Shall We Dansu: Differences Between Japanese Culture And American Culture

There is a vast amount of differences between Japanese culture and American culture. The movie Shall We Dansu is an excellent character study of people that make up the working class in Japan. Shall We Dansu follows depressed business man Mr. Sugiyama as he lives a mundane lifestyle until he finds himself drawn to a ballroom dancing class because of a entrancing woman he always sees there when he is on the train. Despite having an excellent position at the large company he works at, a devoted wife and good daughter, as well as a nice home in the suburbs, Mr. Sugiyama feels increasingly stuck and hopeless. In the film there are implications that in Japan adults have a responsibility to their family and that dominates their lives. Compared to America where adults do have lives separate of work and family, Japanese people tend not to. Despite the short time when business men stop at izakaya( a pub for after-work drinking) and housewives go to coffee shops and tea houses, there isn’t any time for themselves or things they are passionate about. At the …show more content…
Sugiyama grows to greatly enjoy the dance classes and competitions he attends. He also finds a friend in a fellow male dancer who happens to work at the same corporation at him. At the start of Shall We Dansu, Mr. Sugiyama is very quiet, almost silent yet dancing seems to help him not only find passion, but his voice. Nearing the end of the movie he stands up for his friend to co workers at his job, something he would have never done at the beginning. When we first watched Mr. Sugiyama go through his daily routine, he had little to no contact with his wife and zero communication with her. By the end, they have started to communicate and have more compassion for each other and dancing is actually to thank for that. Throughout the film we watch Mr. Sugiyama progress from a miserable and robotic existence to a joyful and passionate one full of