The Men Who My Father Loved (Japanese)

So, I am forgetting the name of the film, but I had seen a Japanese film sometime back, which had a decent story line but backed by a LOT of sex scenes. This film feels similar in the sense that yes, there is a coherent plot and a story that is being told (which could probably have been told as a short story) but there are a LOT of sex scenes in the film. I'd say good 60% plus film is sex scenes. So, I don't know if this is like a soft porn or whatever.

A man returns to his home in Kyoto after being away for a year. His father has been dead now and the sister is taking care of the home. Now that she wants to get married and move with her boyfriend, the sister decides to sell their childhood home since both of their parents have passed away. The boy recalls that his father used to have a favorite watch and starts to look for it, but he stumbles across a notebook titled "My Memories." He starts to read it and sees the words written on the first page saying "The men I loved who passed me by..." and is followed by a record of his father's love life. The film then starts with the love life. The father tells how he met an older man in a movie theatre when he was young teen and how the duo had a long sex and love life where each used the other until just one day they broke up. He then meets another man with whom he shares film interests and the same story follows, until one day they break up too. Then a lot of short strings follow until the guy gets a marriage proposal and decides to get married and have children. Once the wife passed away and the kids moved out, he reconnects with one of the older loves (the film buff) and they renew the lost passion until his death. And this is the guy who had the father's watch. The son meets the guy, just to get to know his father better. In the end, we are told that the son is gay too when his boyfriend comes to visit him.

Lets talk about the sex scenes first. They are not sexual enough to turn it into a porno (at least, in my opinion), but they are not interesting enough to become an essential part of the story. And they are long sequences with elaborate details of the passion and kinks involved. They aren't obscene either. It just hard to put these scenes in a specific bracket. What I do know is that these scenes could use a lot of editing to make this a legit film if the need be. The film instead could have focused on the relationship that the father shared with these men, or the relationship between brother -sister or the son and his boyfriend. Instead everything is show to us just through elaborate sex sequences. Also, what was it with the reactions of the lead guy (he plays both father and son) while having sex. His expressions were as if he is in extreme agony and pain and not pleasure. It almost made me laugh at a few places. This film could have been a very nice and legit short film. As it is now, you can just fast forward though those explicit scenes to understand the film or you can sit through it to enjoy some soft porn. The choice is yours. (3/10)