Write a short summary of what happens in the film

This is a series of commercials with a story on the crisscrossing paths of a high school girl fully dedicated to baseball, and her male classmate admirer. The two encounter each other in various scenes, and the young man seems to be taken by her. However, he wasn’t merely drawn to her because of her cute looks. It was her rare combination of baseball skills and single-minded devotion to baseball that he was entranced by. In the end, he goes to confess to her, not that he likes her in the romantic sense, but instead telling her, “Outer beauty is not the only measure of a woman. Women’s true appeal comes from pursuing your dream full-on, backed by effort and powerful physical strength.” In response to his profession, she recognizes that he is just the right type of guy, so she asks him to be the girl’s baseball team manager.

Cultural/Context information for the jury

Japan ranks 110th out of 149 countries on the Gender Gap Index. Women’s status in Japan is low. For example, girls are not allowed to enter the grounds in the national high school baseball championships because it’s seen as a sacred place only males are allowed. Since this is the Japan’s top-selling baseball game of high school girls, we needed to create momentum toward improving the status of women. Also, there are loads of commercials depicting youthful heterosexual romance in Japan, which imply the message that you should love the opposite sex in your youth. Some teenagers may feel attracted to the same sex, and some may want to devote themselves to sports. As an antithesis to the stereotypes, we appealed the diversity of youth with these commercials by chipping away at romance at the end even though we made audiences think these are typical youth commercials until then.