If you are searching for a light but simply addicting drama, you should pick Long Vacation. The story may began just like the other 'living under the same roof' dramas, but the setting is on 1996 so it was different from other recent dramas. No handphones or emails, so it was more about the characters dealing with themselves regarding their feelings. The simple twist at the end of every episode will keep you want to know more about what will happened next. And the ending is simply beautiful.
The chemistry between the main couple really worked out, it was fun to see them together. Kimura Takuya is as excellent as ever and Yamaguchi Tomoko did a very nice job playing a miserable 31 years old woman. The other casts are also awesome, I didn't find any of them annoying.
The soundtrack is also one of the winning factor for this drama. The opening theme is still one of my favorite song up until this moment (and I always sing it whenever I went for a karaoke) plus all the music pieces they chose for this drama is awesome.
Even though this drama is quite old, it will remain evergreen in my heart. Try watching this drama, you are not going to be disappointed.
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Long Vacation is a real gem. It amazes me how the story and the characters are so forward and even though it such an old drama, the emotions still remain the same. It is timeless. The actors, every single one of them, have brought justice to their characters. I would really like to applaud the casting team too because the actors' appearances compliment the characters and also thank them for casting Takuya Kimura as Sena. This drama has a simple plot, it doesn't have an evil villain, it doesn't have any smidge of thriller and supernatural aspect unlike dramas nowadays, it is just a story about people. The characters and their growth is what makes this drama shine. All the main characters are incredibly different from each other and they somehow still complement each other. I absolutely love their clothes in the show too and oh lord, Takuya Kimura in those shirts with that hair //swoons
In the beginning, I didn't care about Sena? Sena was just another guy. But with every passing episode, I grew attached and I silently and sometimes not so silently began rooting for him, praying for him and scolding him. Sena's sincerity in everything, his hard work and his sensitive nature are all incredible qualities of him I admire. I loved to see him break down his walls. The way this drama, in just 11 episodes, has portrayed Sena's growth is beyond words. He is just one of my favourite characters of all times now because he is so human- he is fragile yet strong. His relationship with Minami intrigues me so much because on paper they are two incredibly different people but in reality, their compatibility is no joke. The mutual respect and understanding they have for each other makes their relationship strong. They are each other's shelters and let me tell you, when you find a person like that, facing the world gets easier. I just love Sena so much and goddd I can't even begin to rave about how Takuya Kimura is a gorgeous, amazing person with such a charming smile!!!!!!!!!!
About Minami, I didn't have much expectations with her when she made her entry into Sena's house. She just seemed too loud for my liking. I was wrong. People might think Minami is aloof, but infact she is always aware of her actions and she is always a responsible woman. She carries herself with dignity, refusing to back down and take shit from anyone. Her positive outlook on life is something I am quite envious of. In the coming years, I aspire to be a strong woman with a shit load of courage like her.
This review is getting long because I have so many feels rn but I'll stop now.
All in all, if you are having thoughts about whether to watch it or not, just do it really, you'll absolutely love it. Warning- you might end up crying about Takuya Kimura's smile but no regrets there really
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the story itself is about a guy and a girl who accidentally have to live under the same roof in the midst of situation where everything they do just don't work out right. the kind of story you can relate to yourself at some point of your life, although not exactly the same
All supporting characters as such Shinji & Momoko have strong presence throughout the drama, and the chemistry between Kimutaku & Tomoko Yamaguchi just feels right. no more-no less, simply a deep connection without having to express much.
There are some parts of the conversation in the drama when you can instantly relate to your own experience. That's the simplicity of this drama that makes it simply unforgettable.
Rewatch? Absolutely.
Recommend? Without a doubt.
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What you might like about it: If you're into stories about an unlikely couple who ends up living together and falling for each other, then you might enjoy this.
The story is rather light and easy to watch. Also, unlike other dramas, this one doesn't drag much.
What might put you off: The female lead is not very likable that it takes a while before you get used to her. The main lead, on the other hand, is quite charming. Frankly, they don’t have much chemistry; however, once you’ve accepted that they’ve actually gotten attracted to each other, you’ll enjoy the events that follow. Another thing that I was not impressed about this drama is the soundtrack. There’s this one song that they play over and over which sometimes does not even fit the scene; it gets irritating after a while.
Overall, this drama is fairly delightful and not quite inferior to romantic comedies that came out more recently. The ending is also sweet and satisfying.
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This review may contain spoilers
Healing long vacation
For me, a relative newbie drama watcher, this drama is ancient history relic. And if it had not been for the Drama Discovery Challenge (perfect title!) I would have never had the idea to consider watching this let alone watch it. And I would have missed a real gem of a drama.The plot is fairly basic: two lonely people get to share an apartment. This forced cohabitation makes them grow and change as individuals and discover real love and affection. Nothing new under the drama sun but this one was excellently written and produced, the cast is perfect and the plot moves forward smoothly without a hitch!
The characters are all too human. Minami, the FL hides behind her cheerfulness the frustration and unhappiness as life seems to pass her by. At the beginning her forcefulness and brazen behaviour are very annoying but in contact with Sena she mellows down a little bit, just enough to become likable and still remain a strong woman and a force of nature. Sena is a pianist, looks like a lost puppy, who wants to become a professional player but has hit the wall which inhibits him from expressing emotion through music that would give him that special something to lift him above the rest. Seta, in contact with a talented but robotic and emotionless student realizes the flaws in his piano playing but still does not know how to remedy it. Minami finds cracks in that wall and breaks it without him ever being aware of it!
The support characters are equally interesting. Minami's brother, a happy-go-lucky Shouji falls for Sena's fellow straight laced pianist. Their relationship is on the lines of extremes opposites attract but can they stay together or will they just bounce off of each other. And then there is this minor character, Sena's piano teacher who has a way with words and uses them to poetically describe piano playing. Beautifully written!
The relationship between Sena and Minami goes through all phases: from acquaintances to reluctant friends to lovers . Since Minami is older, she never really considers Sena a boyfriend material until it is too late and they are deeply in love. They try dating other people only to realize that it is too late for that! They had found the missing part of themselves in each other.
The writers managed to avoid those pesky drama tropes that last for too long: misunderstandings, break ups etc. They are there, otherwise there would be no drama, but they do not take up too much time.
This drama is 27 years old and it shows on a technical plane: the format, the cinematography, the fashion (poor guy and his oversized suits! Awful!), the habits (everyone's smoking everywhere!) and no mobile phones (trying to reach someone on the phone was not easy!). I watched it in poor quality but it was worth it!
The problem that I have with j-dramas in general is the music: too loud, too much of it, sudden changes of tune, wrong music which does not correspond the mood of the scene. I found all of it here. There were some nice original piano pieces as background music. And then there was this tune (which turned out to be a song in the last episode) which played repeatedly in the background with different arrangements (harp, piano, violin, flute). The thing with that tune is that it sounds like a mash up of Tears In Heaven by Eric Clapton and Blowing In The Wind by Bob Dylan. The resemblance to these songs made it very distracting and I found myself listening to the music instead of following the story.
Anyway, this has been a great watch and a beautiful story of facing challenges, deciding what you really want to do with your life and going for it!
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A truly GREAT classic drama
This drama from the very beginning evokes a feeling that I've never really encountered in anything else. It makes me think of summer, of idleness, of bad air conditioning in your apartment, of beer, of riding the bus in circles because you're bored and listless, of summer sunsets that seem to last for hours. Not to get too poetic, but this is a drama that is dripping with atmosphere.The best word I've found to describe Long Vacation is 'liminal', which is a word that is used in anthropology to mean: "the quality of ambiguity or disorientation that occurs in the middle stage of a rite of passage, when participants no longer hold their pre-ritual status but have not yet begun the transition to the status they will hold when the rite is complete". In can also be used in a more... location-based context. 'Liminal spaces' are transitional places, or waiting places like airports, bus stops and school hallways. When you are there for extended periods of time it can feel like you are in an alternate reality.
A good description of liminal spaces and the concept of liminality in psychology and anthropology is this: "You could land [in the liminal space] for any number of reasons. Perhaps a particular event or circumstance has interrupted the life you were living and now everything is up in the air. [...] The liminal space can bring us face-to-face with our inner fears about who we are, how we show up in the world, our strengths and vulnerabilities, and our successes and disappointments. It can cause us to question the very core of our beliefs, practices, and identities".
All of this is a very long way to say that my enjoyment, nostalgia, and textual reading of Long Vacation has always been based upon this idea of liminality. In my opinion it is one of the ultimate liminal texts.
While liminal spaces can sometimes be described as eerie, creepy, or unsettling, Long Vacation imparts none of these feelings. The liminality of the show is warm but somewhat listless. The apartment where the two main characters live is cramped but homey, the building itself is bland but features a huge billboard of a beach on top of it. It doesn't really rain. The sky is blue. The city is busy but feels empty at the same time. The main characters spend time on their roof (where they're probably not really supposed to go), sitting on stone walls, walking the streets, on the highway -- there's this feeling that they're inhabiting the most banal fringes of their society.
Both Minami and Sena are great examples of people who are in transitional periods in their lives and feeling lost. Minami is a model who is slowly getting less and less work, and at the very beginning of the show she is jilted at the alter. Minami is not a married woman, but she feels out of step with younger, single people. She is caught in a liminal space. Sena is a former classical pianist who is now working teaching piano lessons to children. He no longer believes in his ability to be a great piano player, and yet he is unhappy with his life and occupation. On some level he knows what he wants, but he can't take the steps to make it happen.
Both the lead actors are excellent, bringing a charisma and vivacity to their characters. They also have such great chemistry that even their very subtle scenes (and there are a lot of those -- along with plenty of quiet, pensive gazes at one another) feel electric.
At just 11 episodes, this drama zips along very quickly, which I think makes the sluggish and hazy feeling of the show actually enjoyable rather than tiresome. We are boldly introduced to our characters and get a chance to see them in action and the show doesn't waste time with long introductions.
I don't know if it was the intention of the show creators to give Long Vacation such an intense aesthetic, but it definitely worked. In my opinion this is one of the best 'older dramas' that I could recommend to people who haven't watched very many of them. Although it is dated, it avoids many of the tropes that you find throughout older asian dramas (at least the ones I've seen). The story, characters and concept are more original and the execution is more intentional. Overall, this is one of my favourite dramas ever. It's one of the few dramas that I watched when I was younger that still hold up.
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The characters themselves were annoying most of the time. Minami never ceased to be annoying but at least she toned it down a bit after about a third into the drama. Sena is wishy washy for about 10 episodes of the drama. Ryoko is too childish and never grows, Momoko is just a convenience when the writer wants to get the characters from one place to another, never had a real depth. I liked Ru-chan but again she was ignored by the writer and most of the characters, except sometimes Sena. Even Shinji was hard to read as to what he wanted. I thought around episode 9-10 there was an interesting exploration of the character's relationship but then it got somehow dropped :S
So yea I felt the writing was lacking. I loved the choice of music but many times the editing was weird in the way it cuts the sound/music. It wasn't the typical effective way to show a change of mood or some shocking event, it felt just random.
I didn't really care much about the coupling I enjoyed watching the character interactions and I got plenty of that. The weirdest is the Shiji-Sena relationship, but I loved that the most. They're awkward and can't be real friends but they each have deep respect for the other (and probably envy) for different reasons.
Despite my criticism I enjoyed it, I felt genuine and relatable. It would've been a masterpiece if only the characters were given more depth, and the lead girl was less pushy and over intrusive :P
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This review may contain spoilers
There's a lot to like about the presentation of "Long Vacation" and watching it across the span of a couple weeks, I can see why it has the reputation it does among J-drama fans (or, on a more historical note, why it was even called "The King of Ratings" (IIRC) at one point during its run in 1996). It's easy to get into and easy to stick with. There was not a moment where I wanted turn away.As a story, I think I appreciate what it does with Hayama Minami's arc, which is primarily why I stuck with the show from start to finish. Pardon the comparison, but Yamaguchi Tomoko's got a real Sandra Bullock quality to her. It's not hard to fall in love with her journey, and she brings a real personable energy to Minami's story.
I appreciate that "Long Vacation" doesn't dwell on the absence of her would-be husband and instead commits to seeing the character grow past that heartbreak. It really highlights one of the issues with the romance genre in general. The need or desire to give so much time to the character who stranded the protagonist in the hole she has to crawl out of instead of just the person harmed.
By the end of it, I never really cared if she ended up with Sana (in fact, I rather wish she had stayed with Mr. Sugisaki if she was gonna be with anyone), but I liked how the story ended things with them. I was glad to see the character reach a point where she was content with herself. I ultimately appreciated Minami and Sana's friendship more than the idea of their romance, which never really gets a chance to develop like their friendship. (A lot of the "will they/won't they" of the story put too much onus on Minami to act versus Sana, who played around with her too much in my opinion.)
Sana's struggle as a creative is something I could sympathize with. The indecision, the fear of failure, and the pursuit of perfection (almost throwing everything away and subjecting yourself to the unhappiness of life without the thing you love), and how all of that impacts your external relationships (oftentimes for the worse), are all captured nicely in his arc. His indecision is frustrating a lot of the time, but rooting for him wasn't hard (even when I wanted smack him upside his head).
If there's anything I don't like about "Long Vacation" it's how antiquated a lot of the character's thinking is (and how that thinking remains a viral constant in other modern dramas). Minami is constantly dogged for being in her 30s, which is treated like a death sentence. More than one male character (but specifically Sana) employs the virgin/whore dichotomy against her because she doesn't act like the "delicate", "pure (as snow)", and "polite" girl.
While the show excels in trying to paint (romantic) relationships with honesty, it falls back on the tired "men and women will never understand each other" shtick, and it's clear the writers don't have the perspective (knowledge) to really tackle that problematic line of thinking.
The show is also insistent on excusing Minami's brother (Shinji) on a "boys will be boys" basis when he cheats on his girlfriend Ru, then has the gall to call Ru "spoiled" because she acted on her anger towards him. As supporting characters, Ru and Shinji suffer the most because so little time is afforded to them (and honestly, after how the first episode set them up, that's a shame), and the 'love triangle' that jammed into their subplot makes thing worse.
Momoko is a particularly irksome character who acts as the show's summary of its thesis. She's mostly played up as adorkable and loveable, but she just exasperated me, honestly. After Momoko, I don't like the Ryoko character. She encapsulates so much about what I don't like about love triangles. In general she's an empty character who only seems crucial to the show when someone she's dating falls out of favor with her (or vice versa). At best, she magnifies the issues that plagued most of Minami's relationships with men, who treat Ryoko as infallible on the basis that she's the "ideal" that women like Minami should aspire to.
Overall, I think "Long Vacation" gave me everything something like "Good Morning Call" failed to as an awkward story about cagey roommates who become lovers (GMC is also just a messy adaptation of a solid manga). It falls short of being great because of the problems I pointed out, but it doesn't damage the overall experience with the show itself. Great performances and character dynamics kept everything afloat for me.
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It's such a simple yet beautiful story that focuses on not only the love stories but all around development of characters. It has it's ups and downs in the plot but none too complicated and unrealistic. Even rough bumps in the story or between characters isn't blown out of proportion or shown for far too long and from ever angle possible on earth to make the audience realise it's impact. The great acting does that itself.
I WILL FIGHT ANYBODY WHO TELLS ME THIS IS THE SAME KIMURA TAKUYA I SAW IN PRIDE AS 'HALU SATONAKA', the highly charming, smart mouthed heartbreaker. Just kidding. What can I say about his acting, I am wowed everytime I watch him. Also I love the actress Yamaguchi Tomoko and she's such a pleasure to watch onscreen. I'll definitely look for more of her works too. I think the rest of the cast did a fantastic job as well.
The music is strangely addicting specially La La La Love song. The opening credits never get old and it's all good fun.
I am going to watch this drama again and recommend it to any one who's looking for a Jdrama to watch or just something nice. It's a really simple and fun drama and the cast and story will not dissapoint.
Oh god I love the fashion in this. Good ol' 90s, it makes me want to go back. Those sandals and pants and big baggy suits. Kimura Takuya could wrap himself in cabbage leaves and he'll still be the handsomest man I've ever seen. I'm going to check out more of his dramas/movies now and I'm glad I watched "long vacation".
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A hidden gem!
I first put this drama on my watchlist, because of the interesting story but also because of the year that it aired. I really wanted to watch how Japan was portrayed. I watched the clothes they wore, the places they went to, their lives without cell phones with nostalgia. It was a little like a time capsule!Now, what I really liked at first about the drama was male lead's character. He was a shy, honest and generous person. I also liked the female lead, because she was happy and easygoing. They both were nice people, which is not a given. In addition, there wasn't any malicious character, which I really liked. The story wasn't something new and it unfolded somewhat slowly, so I really encourage you to stick to it. The drama had a realistic approach on life and depicted many common situations in life, for example, the worries the society causes to an unmarried woman over 30, how people waver between choices and the attitude you should have when you want someone who doesn't want you. The characters all acted with dignity.
I really recommend this drama to everyone who wants something calm, realistic and slowpaced!
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The storyline itself, not spectacular as such although in the 1990s it might have been considered as such, being it's first of its kind. But the acting and cast of characters largely make for it, their relationship and the ease of their banter, felt so natural. Im astounded how I didn't watch this sooner.
The romance develops itself in a quite realistic manner, and I think it amply depicts why so many couples in more recent dramas just don't sell it. It definitely had to it an undeniable charm, and I can't wait to have a rewatch.
Also I've since watched a tad of Kimura Takuya's works, but you've got to admit that the boyish charm he depicts in long vacation, really is something to appreciate.
And let's not forget Minami's absolute perfection as female lead, sensible at times but nevertheless so fierce and strong. Even the side characters were so perfect, especially Minami's brother- what an absolute scene-stealer!
Anyways, long story short- watch this!!!
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