2LDK [DVD] [2002]

2LDK is part of the "Duel Project," in which super-efficient directors Yukihiko Tsutsumi and Ryuhei Kitamura (Versus), who had both worked on the anthology Jam Films, were each challenged to take one week and make a feature with two actors dueling in a single setting. Kitamura wrote and directed the samurai film Aragami, while Tsutsumi created the urban warfare story 2LDK. The title is an abbreviation, as one might see in a Japanese classified ad, for a two-bedroom apartment with a living room, a dining room, and a kitchen. In 2LDK, Nozomi (Eiko Koiki) is a quiet, compulsively neat country girl who has recently moved to Tokyo in hopes of beginning a film career. Her roommate, Lana (Maho Nonami), is also an actress, but she's been at it for a while. She's brash about using her sexuality to get what she wants, while Nozomi is repressed. The personal space issues that afflict every roommate situation are exacerbated by their wildly different temperaments. While Lana is racked with guilt over a past indiscretion that ended in tragedy, Nozomi is used to being a big fish in a small pond, and has trouble dealing with the pressures of big-city life. When they learn that they're up for the same part in a big film production, the tension mounts. Lana pushes Nozomi's buttons by implying that she's been intimate with a mutual acquaintance she knows is courting Nozomi. Nozomi, who diligently marks nearly every item in the apartment with the first initial of its proper owner, lashes out when she discovers that Lana has used her shampoo, and things gradually escalate from there into an all-out, kill-or-be-killed war.