Watching Shinobu Yaguchi's movie "Dance With Me" was like welcoming a friend that you haven't seen for a while, all those memories of fun and music reflect through a rose-tinted colour of nostalgia- and that is Dance With Me. A movie about overcoming one's fears and embracing one's true passion.

In this movie we follow office worker Shizuka that has long since forgotten about her passion for dancing and singing- through a weird chance encounter with a washed out 60s TV show hypnotist she starts to dance and sing whenever there's music around.

You can clearly see that this is almost a spiritual successor to Shinobu's movie "Swing Girls", I don't know why but whenever there's music in Shinobu's movies there's always something that's deeply affecting and fun, and Dance With Me is no different- the songs are fun and catchy as hell and you feel so happy after it!

The movie looks beautiful, it has a very modern look but whenever it changes to the song and dancing scenes, that's where it really shines! Also the fact that we not only have Tokyo as the background but a whole road trip to Sapporo as well- yes this movie turns into a funny as heck road movie. Usually I'm not a fan of "comedy of errors" where everything goes wrong because the payoff is usually always expected, but in this one it's actually funny and the payoff is good!

Only negative thing that I can think of, and honestly it might be a fault of the subtitles that I used but I found some explanations near the end about why some characters and motivations are there to be non-existent which is a bit annoying but it doesn't deter from the enjoyment of the movie!

The actors are so funny and amazing, the lead role of Shizuka is funny and so good at singing and dancing! As well as her road friend Yoko, played by Chay, is so funny and natural at comedy- loved every single minute she was on screen!

Watch this movie for a fun and lighthearted time, honestly it's what's needed in this dark world- thank you so much Shinobu for making movies that lift my heart from sadness!

Shizuka (Ayaka Miyoshi) works at a large finance company and might be about to get a big break there, but her sister asks her to babysit for her at just the wrong time. Finally finishing an assignment, she takes her niece to a carnival, where she is inadvertently hypnotized - whenever she hears music, she must immediately burst into song herself, and dance too! Having never cared for musicals, suddenly she is a musical star, as far as she knows - but the people around her just see an increasingly touched young lady jumping on tables and pulling down chandeliers. To save her job, and her reputation, she must find the fellow who hypnotized her, but he is touring the provinces, necessitating a road trip....

This is an absolutely delightful film, both a highly choreographed and staged musical and a spoof of musicals at the same time; light, frothy, with a minimum of plot (finding the old hypnotizer who is also being hunted by loan sharks, having Shizuka meet another woman conned by the old man whom she first dislikes, then needs and finally becomes best friends with) and a maximum of moments when she bursts into song. Definitely nothing that will make you question the deeper meaning of life or the human condition; just a whole lot of fun and catchy tunes too!

Dance With Me is a loveable musical movie that has a strong story, not like other musical movies. If we usually watch alone people or a couple or group of people suddenly sing without reason in other musicals, we can see people that have big reason to sing every hear music in this film. It's didn't just entertain but also inspiring. I love this movie very much.