The Eel 1998

In Chiba Prefecture, Japan, acting on the advice of an anonymous note, Takuro Yamashita returns home one night to find his wife with another man. He kills her and then surrenders to the police. After serving his time, he is released and starts a small barber shop, bringing along a pet eel that he talks to while largely keeping others at a distance.

He soon helps save Keiko Hattori from a suicide attempt, and she begins working at the shop. She begins developing romantic feelings for him, but he remains emotionally aloof, even turning down the boxed lunches she prepares for him after he goes eel-hunting with the local fisherman. The fragile balance of their relationship is strained as Takuro tries to maintain his isolation.

Takuro recognizes the garbageman who appears to have known him from prison, and the man starts to stalk both Takuro and Keiko, convinced that Takuro hasn’t shown genuine remorse. He tries to rape Keiko and leaves a letter detailing Takuro’s past on the barber shop door, though it is removed by Takada. Keiko learns she is pregnant with the baby of Eiji Dojima, a loan shark, making abortion no longer an option.

One night, the garbageman confronts Takuro at the shop, delivering a stern lecture about jealousy and guilt, and the two clash until Takuro can fend him off. Keiko returns to her former company as vice-president and retrieves her mother’s bankbook, prompting Dojima to arrive with henchmen to accuse her of theft in a bid to reinvest the funds elsewhere. Dojima’s group and Keiko’s fight culminates in a tense moment of deception—the false revelation that Keiko is pregnant with Takuro’s child. The authorities reveal that Keiko’s mother never signed power of attorney papers for Dojima, and a parole-violation meeting for Takuro sends him back to prison for a year. In the end, Takuro frees the eel, and Keiko, holding onto hope, accepts a boxed lunch from him and promises to wait for him with their baby.