Maison de Himiko is the second film created through the collaboration of the director Isshin Inudo and the scriptwriter Aya Watanabe. Following the success of their first film, Josee, the Tiger and the Fish, which focused on the sexuality of the handicapped, Maison de Himiko revolves around the theme of 'homosexuals and family'.
The story begins when a man called Haruhiko (Odagirijō) visits a Saori (Shibasaki Ko), a young woman who works in the office of a painting company. Haruhiko is the ex-lover of Saori's gay father Himiko (Min Tanaka) whom she detests. Himiko is the manager of a nursing home for homosexuals called 'Maison de Himiko'. Himiko himself has cancer and his end is drawing near. Lured by the high hourly pay, Saori starts to work in the nursing home. Through her contact with the lively but somewhat sad elderly homosexuals in the home and the development of her subtle relationship with Haruhiko, Saori gradually comes to acknowledge her father's existence. The gay community of Maison de Himiko had found refuge among fellow homosexuals after being alienated from their families because of their sexuality. However, in approaching the final years of their lives, they are forced to face their families. This is perhaps the reason for their profound sadness.
Thus, the film can be interpreted as the story of sexuality and the family. However, my attention was in fact drawn by the film's interesting depiction of heterosexuals. As the director himself says, the executive director of the painting company where Saori works, Hosokawa (Hidetoshi Nishijima), is a person who would change the channel if he came across a film like this on television. He is involved with one of Saori's female colleagues, who takes big pride in his power and behaves as if she owns the place. However, when a new employee becomes Hosokawa's lover, she is forced to quit. The story revolves around the conflict between women who are made the playthings of a powerful man - an old scenario. The women cannot express themselves by any other means than using their beauty as a weapon to hang off a powerful man. It can be said that this is typical of modern sexuality and gender roles which are based on separate standards for measuring the value of women (beauty) and of men (money).
However, Saori and Haruhiko are not part of this game. Haruhiko is an outsider by virtue of being gay. To Hosokawa's bragging that he would never have sex with a man because he's sure that 'it hurts', Haruhiko replies: 'Why don't you become the one who causes the hurt?' Haruhiko's ironic remark is prompted by Hosokawa's evident inability to imagine himself in the role of the one who thrusts in the context of anal sex. Hosokawa flinches at Haruhiko's remark but manages to save face by saying: 'Stop teasing a straight man!' Why does Hosokawa flinch at Haruhiko's remark? Is it perhaps because Haruhiko manages to penetrate the veil of Hosokawa's so-far unquestioned sexuality? I will focus here on male sexuality as it is the focus of this film, with the exception of Saori,. It can be argued that most of heterosexual men today are not really truly heterosexual. In a world which imposes heterosexuality, it is considered the norm to be heterosexual and heterosexual men are not faced with the need to question their sexuality.
In such a society homosexual men inevitably start questioning their sexuality. This is the reason why they cannot help teasing 'straight' men like Hosokawa who are unaware and ignorant of the problems of sexual identity. I myself am a straight man like Hosokawa and have had similar experiences. Hosokawa is used to consider men solely as an object of friendly, not sexual feelings. Hosokawa considers gay men as potential attackers rather than as individuals with whom he would communicate voluntarily. At Haruhiko's remark, Hosokawa for once may have envisaged himself as potentially being involved in a homosexual relationship for the first time in his life - this might be the reason for his flinching at Haruhiko's words.
On the other hand, Saori is actually involved in a sexual relationship with Hosokawa. After having sex, she starts crying and tells Hosokawa: 'I'm not crying for any of the reasons that you think!' Saori does not take part in the above-mentioned gender-role game and her behavior is quite unfathomable to Hosokawa. Her statement is a proclamation of her nonconformity with the group of the 'straight' whose personification is Hosokawa. Her tears are the expression of her sadness which she is not able to share with her gay father, his lover, or the inhabitants of the nursing home. Her words make it clear that she is different from Hosokawa and as a result his sexuality appears as being relative.
The last scene of the filmshows Hosokawa and Saori kissing in Hosokawa's office. Hosokawa makes further advances but she stops him saying: 'We promised each other not to have sex anymore, didn't we?' then she asks him to stamp the documents which was the reason why she had come into his office. When Hosokawa's sexuality is questioned, the power relationship between Hosokawa and Saori also becomes relative. The film very skillfully manages to present the complex interrelationship between male-female power relations and sexuality. It depicts human relations involving sexuality at a painting company where heterosexual love and fixed men-women power relations are a major prerequisite. Through the interaction between Hosokawa, Saori and Haruhiko, the very foundation of human relations is made to appear relative.
The film depicts in a contrasting way the 'straight' relationships of Hosokawa at the painting company and the human relations in Maison de Himiko with Saori moving in between the two. Haruhiko introduces Saori to Maison de Himiko where she communicates with the inhabitants; on the other hand she has a relationship with Hosokawa. If we focus on the character of Hosokawa, the film can be seen as presenting the gradual process through which a heterosexual man's sexuality becomes relative. This process exposes the context-dependent nature of heterosexual framework at the painting company.
Ryo Kawaguchi, ICU Undergraduate