One of the most hotly anticipated films of the 11th Okinawa International Move Fest was Erica 38, which screened Saturday afternoon at the Mihama 7plex in Chatan. This based-on-fact story follows small-time businesswoman, hostess and grifter Satoko Watabe who became a big time con artist and fled to Thailand. The title comes from the fact the woman changed her name to Erica in southeast Asia an presented herself as 38 years old, despite the fact she was well into her sixties at the time.

The work is the brainchild of producer Kazuyoshi Okuyama and has garnered much attention in Japan as it was a big news story when the actual Watabe was arrested. The project also was blessed with the cooperation of legendary star Kiki Kirin, both as an actress and a producer.

Satoko (Miyoko Asada) is a bar hostess and small time operator with a gift of being able to sweet talk people. She starts a pyramid scheme business selling vitamins and is doing just all right. But her gift of selling is noticed by a rich woman who introduces her to Hirasawa (Takehiro Hira), a handsome con man who sets up a scheme to bilk investors of large amounts of money. As the gelder starts pouring in Satoko and Hiraswa become lovers. Naturally things go wrong. Satoko figures out Hirasawa has many other girlfriends, and is just using her for his scams. Devastated, she embezzles all the company money, thought to be about 8 million dollars, and flees to Thailand. There she lives a life of luxury with her 20-something Thai lover but the Japanese police track her down. When the arrest her the salacious details of 60-plus year old Japanese woman passing herself off as 38 and taking Thai lovers thrills the public.

Director Yuichi Hibi has a deft touch, building Satoko’s character from a sweet talking woman with questionable honesty to a full-on, big-time con artist and embezzler. He shows Satoko’s hard-scrabble childhood with an abusive father and cowed mother, thus earning the audiences sympathy despite her actions. Like all grand tragedies the protagonist Satoko is not a bad person, just flawed. And her silver tongue allows her to access riches and young men. Salacious, thrilling and compelling Asada’s tour-de-force performance adds even more power to this crackling story.

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