Osaka Elegy

is a 1936 Japanese drama film directed by Kenji Mizoguchi. It forms a diptych with Mizoguchi's Sisters of the Gion which shares much of the same cast and production team, and is considered an early masterpiece in the director's career. Plot Sonosuke Asai, head of the Asai Drug Company, lives in an unhappy marriage with his wife Sumiko. While he treats the servants disdainfully, Sumiko reminds him that he owes his position to her family which he married into. He makes advances to one of his employees, telephone operator Ayako, which the young woman fends off. After work, Ayako discusses this with her colleague and boyfriend Susumu, complaining that he doesn't help her collecting the 300 yen which her father embezzled from his employer and is forced to pay back. After an argument with her father, who argues that he embezzled the money to finance his children's education, Ayako leaves home. She takes up Asai's offer to become his mistress, asking him in return to give her 300 yen to pay back her father's debts. She quits her job and moves into an apartment which he pays for her. When they attend a bunraku performance, they are confronted by his wife who furiously accuses Asai for having an affair. Fujino, a business acquaintance of Asai, intervenes, lying that Ayako was his date, not her husband's. Ayako runs into Susumu in a shopping mall. Asked about her flashy appearance, she lies that she is now working in a beauty salon. When Susumu confesses that he contemplated the idea to marry her, she runs off in embarrassment. Shortly after, Sumiko shows up in Ayako's and Asai's apartment, demanding that he comes with her and puts an end to his affair. Ayako stays on living in her new home.