FYC: Rinko Kikuchi for ‘Tokyo Vice’

Rinko Kikuchi first came to be known in the States for her supporting performance in Alejando Innaritu’s film Babel, which brought four seemingly unrelated, but eventually interlocking stories together. Kikuchi played a troubled deaf girl dealing with rejection, her disability, and troubles at home, all while being surrounded by one of the biggest, most active, and noisiest cities in the world–Tokyo. Kiuchi was 25 at the time of Babel’s release, but effectively passed for much younger in delivering a performance that made the Academy take notice, making her the first Japanese actress to receive an Oscar nomination since Miyoshi Umeki in Sayanora, way back in 1957.

After Babel, Kikuchi would sometimes be seen in western projects (The Brothers Bloom, both Pacific Rim films, 47 Ronin, and Westworld come to mind), but it was not until Tokyo Vice in 2022 that Kikuchi was given a role in an American production that matched the depth and complexity of her breakthrough role in Babel. As Eimi Maruyama, the supervisor and senior writer at the major Tokyo newspaper, the Meicho Shimbun, Eimi is tasked with overseeing the crime beat work of journalist Jake Adelstein (played by Ansel Elgort), the first “Gaijin” (foreigner) reporter in the history of the paper.

Much of Tokyo Vice’s first season is made up of Eimi’s efforts to corral Adelstein, whose American impatience clashes with the culture of Japan writ large, but also within the newsroom. Eimi has to consistently reel in Jake’s compulsive nature to get the story at all costs, while also managing her own boss’s concern about her ability to manage Jake and her role overall. There is a real feminist angle taken by the show in that first season (as well as into the second). Tokyo Vice is not a show built from whole cloth, it is based on the real Jake Adelstein’s memoir of the same name. Set in the early 2000’s Maruyama was a real person, dealing with misogyny in her own culture, managing a staff made unruly by Adelstein, covering for Adelstein when her desire to get the story got the best of her, and (on the show) also managing the care of her live-in brother who is suffering from mental health issues.

All of these concerns gave Kikuchi a lot to do in season one, but in season two, the width and depth of her part was expanded greatly. As Adelstein and Maruyama begin to meet in the middle regarding their shared desire to take down a high-ranking (and highly dangerous) member of the Yakuza (Tozawa, played fiercely by Ayumi Tanida), their heightened risk level becomes shared too. They are less physically and professionally safe while following Tozawa’s story. One must understand that the Yakuza in the early aughts of Japan were intertwined within the fabric of Tokyo society. They were given great deference by the press and the police. To take down a member of the Yakuza was a complicated and potentially life-risking endeavor. 

In season one, Eimi would bend only slightly in Jake’s direction, but in season two, she has to come forward almost in full to not only make the story, but to adhere to her own code of journalistic ethics when her own boss wants to downplay, or even hide, the story. The show’s creator, JT Rogers, also takes us further outside of the newsroom with Eimi. Eimi starts dating a fellow journalist (sweetly played by Takaki Uda) who works at a magazine, and who makes great efforts to pierce Eimi’s defenses–even trying to make a connection with her troubled brother (well played by Keita). The way Kikuchi plays Eimi is a perfect example of operating through the internal. Eimi is very guarded. She has no children. She keeps her private life very private. You get the sense that very few people know what she is dealing with at home with her brother whose diagnosis is not clear, but thinking of him as bipolar would not be wildly outside the realm of likelihood. Eimi juggles two lives–work and her brother. For her to stretch herself to believe in the possibility of romance is a huge step for her, and Kikuchi’s vulnerability shines through her eyes and her wonderfully expressive face. 

As season two moves forward, Eimi is seen failing at both the paper and in her hope for love. Neither shortcoming can be laid at her feet. Her boss may not be fully corrupt, but he does believe in the idea that some stories are better off under rug swept. And as for her boyfriend, Eimi’s brother ruins their chances by all but abducting her new beau’s childhood son from school. Eimi is faced with two choices: 1) To accept her boss’s decision or to take the story to another outlet and quite possibly end her career at the paper, and 2) To put her brother before her own life, or step away from him and leave him to his own devices. 

Eimi is a character forged in honor and decency. In the hands of another actor, the role of Eimi might have been performed in an overly sympathetic, “woe is me,” kind of way . Kikuchi’s take on Eimi could not be further away from that description. Yes, she is scared, insecure, and full of worry. But Kikuchi shows you a person, who when pushed, displays a spine cast in iron. In both cases, getting the story out and caring for her brother, she takes the hardest road, putting herself second and her service to family and to the truth first. 

What Kikuchi accomplishes in Tokyo Vice, as an ensemble player, is truly remarkable. She makes the most of every second she is on screen, and when you see the ache in her eyes over the difficult choices laid out before her, you ache too. Kikuchi sneaks out of the screen and into the center of your chest. She does so like the strangest of thieves, with no desire to manipulate or take anything from you, only to show you, ever so quietly, the need to be seen. 

Rinko Kikuchi deserves to be seen by the Academy.