DRAMA

Until his divorced mother Yuriko suddenly appears, third-grader Ryota is quite happy living with his warm-hearted grandparents in a quiet farming and fishing village by the sea. Yuriko, who up until this point has shown little interest in her son, has all of a sudden decided to be a mother again and wants to take Ryota back to Tokyo. The boy naturally resists, resentful that his life must be thrown into turmoil by what appears to him to be simple adult capriciousness. The village is the only real home he knows and he does not want to leave it. Nor does he want to leave his best friend and confidant, his mentally retarded Uncle Ichiro. But all things change. Ryota's grandmother dies, and boy comes to understand something of his mother's agony and the fact that she is trying to do her best. The series follows the development of the relationship between the boy, Yuriko, and Ichiro. Throughout, the image of insects - Ryota's hobby - is thematic. The message? Perhaps that all living beings are creatures of nature and must submit to fate and forces greater than themselves.