The Munekata Sisters

Setsuko Munekata lives with her much younger unmarried sister, Mariko, in Tokyo. Their widowed father is dying and has moved to the more traditional-Japanese city of Kyoto. Setsuko’s husband, Ryosuke Mimura (referred to as Mimura), is an unemployed engineer who habitually comes home drunk and shows no affection for her. She bears this in a resigned manner without complaint and supports them both by running a bar at which Mariko also works, but which is doing badly financially and is threatened with closure. Mariko criticizes Setsuko’s traditional attitudes and resignation her towards her husband’s behaviour, as opposed to her own ‘modern’ outlook to life.