In Japan, the flood-tide of woman liberation movement, which washed over the world in the late 1960s and early 1970s, started as the Woman Lib movement in 1970. True to the slogan “From women to women”, Japanese women in the movement became each other’s colleagues, cast off the notion of women defined by men and sought new self definitions and lives. This movement was also political in that it led to the fight against abortion restriction.
 Illuminating the Woman Lib movement in Japan, Kurihara’s film gave women all over the world a fresh shock. Now, 20 years later, the lives of the women who participated in this movement at that time is diverse. Saying “If I had known that there had been Woman Lib movement, I would not have left Japan.”, Kurihara shows that the Woman Lib movement in Japan is not over yet by investigating the lives of the five women who led the movement. Kurihara decided to make a documentary to trace the history of the Woman Lib movement after meeting Yamato Humiko, one of its leaders who died at 39 of lung cancer. In her film, Kurihara investigates the real state of the women’s movement in Japan which was negatively received and over after only 5 years. What are the aims of the Woman Lib movement? What effect does the Woman Lib have on Japanese society, and how do the women who participated in that movement make a living now?
 An examination of the personal trajectories these women’s lives have taken reveals one history of women in contemporary Japan. (Jung Soowan)