I Was Born, But...

Yoshii, an office clerk, moves with his family to his boss' neighborhood in the Tokyo suburbs. Though his two sons, Ryoichi and Kenji, are initially reluctant to go to school because of a bully and his gang, they eventually turn the tables to take his place. One day, the two brothers visit their new "friend," Taro, who also happens to be the son of their father's boss, Iwasaki. There, they chance upon a home movie filmed by Iwasaki, in which their father is playing a fool. The boys are shocked to witness their usually strict and patriarchal father appearing in such subservience to his boss. Billed as a "comedy of embarrassments," I Was Born, But... shows the effects of depression on the rapidly modernizing urban space of Japan, along with a curious class-consciousness.