Shibuya, a Tokyo district of seemingly perpetual redevelopment and shimmering skyscrapers crammed with offices, shops and eateries; the sort of place that makes it is easy to forget that poverty exists in Japan. Perhaps an ideal location for a screening of The Ones Left Behind: The Plight of Single Mothers in Japan, a documentary that tackles an often-overlooked aspect of an under-reported wider issue.
Japan’s overall child poverty rate is above the OECD average, and nearly half of the 1.4 million single-parent households live below the poverty line despite around 85 percent of such parents being in work.
Inevitably, the film doesn’t always make for easy viewing. Some of the mothers recount escapes from abusive husbands, while all tell of hardships faced or still being faced.
Single motherhood is no walk in the park in any country, and Australian director Rionne McAvoy doesn’t pretend otherwise, but shines a light on Japanese shades of the phenomenon.
Enduring without complaint remains highly valued in Japan, a tendency that can produce negative consequences when people are truly struggling.
‘The Ones Left Behind: The Plight of Single Mothers in Japan’
“There is a great deal of pride involved in the refusal to seek help, in not wanting to ask for money from the government,” McAvoy tells The Hollywood Reporter.
Even the vast majority of NPOs and other volunteer groups working in the field didn’t want to be featured in the documentary, says McAvoy, who also struggled to get single mothers to appear on camera.
“But since the film was made, I’ve a had lot emails from single mothers who are really glad it has highlighted the problem. Some said just watching the trailer made them cry,” reports McAvoy.
The Ones Left Behind has already picked up 17 awards at film festivals and is running at K’s Cinema in Tokyo’s Shinjuku in November, but McAvoy is still working on nationwide and international distribution.
In attendance at the Shibuya screening in late September were the UK and Norwegian ambassadors, along with then digital minister and prime ministerial hopeful Taro Kono (he lost out in a vote a few days later).
Speaking after the screening, Kono acknowledged that Japan’s government needed to do better, identifying the gender wage gap and pay differences between regular and irregular employees as major factors.
“I believe that the first step toward solving this problem will be if more people who see this film become aware of this problem and take action to correct it,” said Kono. “Although we call them single-parent households, there is a clear difference in income between single-father households and single-mother households in Japan.”
Some of the experts quoted in the film cited the U.K. as an example of how to address child poverty. However, British ambassador to Japan Julia Longbottom pointed out that the country she represents has gone backwards since the late 1990s and early 2000s government of Tony Blair helped lift a million children out of poverty. The U.K. now has child poverty rates similar to Japan, she noted.
On paper, McAvoy seems an unlikely filmmaker for this topic. A lifelong martial artist – the reason he first came to Japan – his dream was to become an action star. He spent a decade in the ring of Japan’s colorful professional wrestling circuit, where he fights under the moniker Rionne Fujiwara, and still makes the occasional appearance.
McAvoy found himself behind the camera of a short film he was appearing in to showcase his action chops when the director had to leave Japan due to visa issues. Another big break came with Japan’s borders closed during the pandemic, leading the BBC to hire his production company for a project. He has plans for a series of The Ones Left Behind films, aiming to next take on the subject of child suicide, which has continued to rise even as the total number of Japanese people taking their own lives has declined.