Ruri no Shima (2005) [E 01 – 10 END]

Profile

• Drama: Ruri’s Island
• Romaji: Ruri no Shima
• Japanese: 瑠璃の島
• Director: Ryuichi Inomata, Kenji Ikeda
• Writer: Yoshiko Morishita, Katsu Moriguchi (novel), Toshio Terada
• Producer: Masahiro Kunimoto
• Network: NTV
• Episode: 10
• Release Date: April 16 – June 18, 2005
• Runtime: 21:00-21:54
• TV Ratings: 12.6% (weekly average)
• Language: Japanese
• Country: Japan

Plot

This is a touching drama about a young girl never loved by her parents, who begins to live with a foster family on a small isolated island and how she learns to love again, bonding with her new family. ‘The story is set on Hatomi Island, a small island in the southernmost part of Japan. The population of the island is only 49 people, and the island is so small that you can circle it in an hour. There are no hospitals, no police, no banks, no convenience stores on the island, but it is a beautiful island surrounded by coral, and full of blooming hibiscus flowers. Then, the only school on that beautiful island becomes in danger of being closed…Since there are no more children on the island, the only public institution on the island, the elementary school, which is a symbol of hope, is in danger of being closed. Closing the school means that the island would be abandoned from society, and eventually become an uninhabited island. To try to avoid the school closure, Yuzo Nakama, who was born and raised on the island, has an idea that he will bring a foster child from Tokyo to live on the island. He goes to Tokyo to look for a foster child, and the girl he meets is Ruri Fujisawa, a flashy dressed 6th grader with wavy hair, who has grown up never knowing her parents’ love.