Streaming Sleepers: In 2LDK, Coexistence Is A Bloodsport!
Here’s a fun little hourlong pick-me-up at home to take your mind off of life’s unwaning woes: The story of two actresses, Nozomi (Eiko Koike) and Lana (Maho Nonami), who are staying together at a luxurious two bedroom apartment with a living room, dining room and kitchen in Tokyo – both vying for the same part in a yakuza movie.
Take their clashing personality traits made abundantly clear in their increasingly passive-aggresive demeanor toward one another, and top it with the fact that they both come to realize they’ve been romantically involved with the same man. What you get is a powder keg of unrepentant bloodlust that rears its ugly head just twenty minutes in, followed by more build-up ten minutes later when yelling, manic music battling and boundary-violating escalates into face-slapping, and then pretty much an all-out brawl using anything blunt, sharp, or deadly.
At the root of this contained tale of clashing egos and incorrigible ambitions is a lesson to be learned. There’s a green parrot that sits nicely, adjacent to the goings-on our two leads amid the consequential fallout in this aspect, made even more grim by all we come to know and learn of these two afflicted and stunning characters; both chasing something they believe can either make or break them.
That’s pretty much what awaits in Yukihiko Tsutsumi’s 2LDK, one of two entries of the 2003 DUEL Project, made with a distinctive V-Cinema feel, especially if you’ve only recently come away from screening titles like Banmei Takahashi’s unnerving 1988 psychological horror thriller, Door, or whatever throwback genre pick of your choosing.
For years I missed out on the former title after finding it on DVD and missing copies at my local Suncoast and my YesAsia and the now defunct HKFlix picks always being Out-Of-Stock. Personally I’d prefer to have a physical copy of this film with all the feats and trimmings, although if you’re keen on checking out 2LDK, then Tubi is the place to be. Its opponent movie, at least as of this article, can be found here.
Native New Yorker. Been writing for a long time now, and I enjoy what I do. Be nice to me!