Full Summary with Spoilers

I submitted a summary to the main page, but here's an incredibly detailed description with spoilers.:

Summary: Yume Nara Samete

The movie begins with just credits, no images, and the haunting sound of someone whistling a sad, longing tune. Then we see the whistler is a young woman, Ai, riding in the car driven by her manager Bando. Bando asks her about the song, and Ai tells him a story: The song, Yume Nara Samete, was written by a dear friend of hers, now deceased. The friend had an affair with her high school homeroom teacher which ended when the teacher went back to his wife and children. The friend then went to his apartment complex and jumped off the building. The movie then cuts to show the friend standing on the edge for a few seconds before she lets herself fall and hit the pavement. Bando says he likes the melody. Ai tells him her friend made a CD of it for her, and Bando wants to hear it. Then Ai and Bando arrive at work.

Meanwhile, it's time to get up for Horibe. His alarm rings until he wakes up. Then he opens the windows for a morning breath of fresh air, feeds his tetras, and showers. Before going to work he stops in front of his poster of Ai and prays for them both to have a good day at work.

Ai, meanwhile, is at her own job as a model. She's modeling in white underwear as a photographer coaches her poses and takes pictures in the studio. Everything's going fine until the photographer tells her to “shikou” like a sumo wrestler. Bando puts a stop to it, as it's too sexual for Ai's image. The photographer insists that the manager of the magazine wants the pose and if she doesn't do it, she'll lose the job. Bando doesn't budge; Ai mustn’t ruin her image, and he ends the shoot.

Horibe is working at his job in a convenience store. He thanks a customer who pays for his goods, and then thanks him again as he leaves. Another customer comes up to him and chides him for thanking twice when once is enough. Then she offers him a job at her store in Shinjuku, but Horibe politely declines as he prefers the convenience store, and especially the poster of Ai in the store. The poster is identical to the one Horibe has in his home. He's a fan of Ai even though she's still a rookie; in fact, Horibe has been a fan of hers even before her debut. The customer leaves, and Horibe thanks her twice in the same way.

Ai walks home from the photo shoot, but she is followed by Bando's wife who just watches her. Inside, Ai puts in the CD of her friend's song, hits play, and listens. The song is haunting not only in melody but in lyrics as well.

I love you, I love you... your words...
I wish I could have been the first to live
Up until now, I had faced the wind with trembling shoulders.
I love you, I love you... my words...
Just how much can my words pierce through your heart?
Hiding my tears, I gaze at your face

If this is a dream, please wake me up
Being held by you and being loved by you
If this is a dream then I don't need it
Then maybe my love really exists.

Farewell, farewell... someone whistles
(whistling)
The wind whistles through these streets
I really don't like it
From now on, will you stand in the wind
And will your shoulders tremble?

If this is a dream, please wake me up
Being held by you and being loved by you
If this is a dream, then I don't need it
Then maybe my love really exists
If this is a dream, please wake me up
Being held by you and being loved by you
If this is a dream, then I don't need it
I can instead live on together with you

As the song plays, Ai listens, Horibe works, and Mrs. Bando watches.

After the song, Ai is packing things away in a cardboard box and taping it shut. Bando calls to tell her he's scheduled a re-shoot. The magazine said that the shikou was all the photographer's idea. Bando also wants to hear Ai's song because he wants it to be the song she uses to debut as a singer. Mrs. Bando listens to her husband on the phone as she washes the dishes. Her face betrays no emotion, but a glass she's washing breaks in her hands.

Ai takes the box down to the convenience store where Horibe works. She wants it delivered. Horibe recognizes her right away. Flustered, he gives her a slip to fill out and asks if she lives nearby. She tells him she just moved. Horibe then asks her if she's the girl from the poster. Awkwardly, Ai responds, “I was told in situations like this to say, 'No, it's not me.'” Of course, that makes it obvious that she is really who he thinks she is. Ai is surprised to have a fan since the only work she's done is that poster.

Ai is excited to have a fan. She tells him, for no reason other than she wants to, that the box contains her clothes and it's the first package she's ever sent. She also tells him she has a little sister in Shodo-shima, to which Horibe replies he already knows. This surprises Ai, and after a few questions she realizes Horibe knows everything about her, even the dentist's office she went to in grade school. Ai asks if he knows all this because he's from Shodo-shima too, but Horibe can't quite answer. She pays for the package, and then Horibe gathers up some cartons of milk to give her as a present so she can be healthy. He also asks her to come back. She leaves, and he thanks her twice.

The next morning, Horibe showers. He doesn't notice, but his body hair is coming out in large quantities. At work, as he stocks the coolers, his boss asks him if he's feeling sick. Horibe says he's been ill since he was a child. Boss doubts that, and comments that his complexion is very fair and feminine. Horibe brushes him off: “How many girls with chin stubble do you know?” To which the manager tells him that there isn't any stubble on his face. Boss also notices Horibe is rounder, and wonders if Horibe's hormones are all out of whack. Horibe runs to the bathroom and looks at himself. Even though he hasn't shaved in days, he doesn't have a single hair on his face.

Ai's photo shoot is going better. She's wearing a dress instead of underwear, and is posed sitting. Bando comments that she used to do tough-girl shoots, but prefers the dainty kind so he's getting them for her instead. After the shoot Ai gives Bando the CD. He wants to listen to it alone, so he goes out into his car and puts it in. The song plays in full again. Bando leans the car seat back, closes his eyes, and listens. Ai comes outside while he's listening and sees him in the car, absorbing the song. When it's over, Bando takes the CD out of the player and just stares at it until he notices Ai watching him. He lowers the window and wonders if Ai's friend will forgive her for singing the song in public. Ai tells him the song belongs to her, and that her friend wanted her to sing it. Bando wants it recorded right away for her commercial, and that they must start immediately.

That night, Ai runs to the convenience store to see Horibe. She's so happy she wants to share it with someone, so she asks him to get some milk and meet her after his shift. He's eager to please and is worried that she'll be mad it took him so long to get off work, but she isn't. She tells him she's going to be in a TV commercial, the first thing she's done besides posters, and it'll be for her CD. Horibe asks if the song is by her best friend Hiromi.

Ai is surprised that not only does Horibe know about Hirome, but he knows the whole story she told Bando at the beginning. Horibe says that he knows everything about her except that she just moved. Ai finds that pathetic, but in a good way. She's flattered to have a stalker. Horibe doesn't think he's a stalker, he tells her that he's “living her.” He begins to describe her life: she kept tropical fish up until she moved, lived in a hole-in-the-wall apartment, kept up posters. When she came home, she'd knock on the ashtray at the table. Go to bed at 11, wake up at 7. When she wakes up she opens the windows right away to get a breath of fresh air, then she feeds the fish and takes a shower. He does this every morning because he is living her. The only difference is in age and gender. Everything in his apartment is exactly like hers. He invites her to see, but she thinks it's a come-on. Furthermore, she's incredibly creeped out and wants to leave. She doesn't think having a stalker is flattering anymore.

Horibe then explains: “Kyuugoku no Ai” means to live someone else's life. When she went to the dentist in Shodo-shima, when her mother abandoned her, and when she went to boarding school, Horibe decided to live as her. Ai then remembers him, from Horibe Dental. She saw him one day as she and her mother left. He watched her leave, and then never saw her after that so that he could keep her as a fantasy. That ended, of course, when she sent the package. Ai tells him that she doesn’t want to see him again, and she runs off. Horibe agrees: she won't ever see him again.

Ai brushes past Mrs. Bando on her way home, after she's stopped running. Ai doesn't see Mrs. Bando stop, slowly turn, and watch her leave.

Soon it's time for Ai to record. Her voice isn't very strong or on-key, but she's got a good start on the song. Horibe returns to work as he always has, and Ai works on the song. Driving home, she asks Bando what he thinks. Bando says she was “not bad,” but she still sounds like an amateur. Dejected, she comments that she's just not cut out for singing. Bando gives her a firm warning: “I don't ever want to hear you say you're just cut out for something, or not cut out for something. We're not at that level anymore. When given a job, we do it. And when we do it, we do it the best we can.”

The next day they have to record the commercial. A camera crew films her on the beach. Modeling comes much more naturally to her than singing. But that night, Mrs. Bando is again walking out on the streets with purpose. Ai's singing accompanies the scene as she looks distressed and determined. Ai continues recording, but her voice is still amateur.

At work, Horibe drops a case of snacks. He looks at his hands and notices that they're different- smaller, daintier. He leaves work even though he's still on the clock, jumps on his bike, and pedals home as fast as he can. Once there, he closes himself in his bathroom and looks at his hands, his arms. They're the arms of a woman. His penis is gone. The phone rings, but he can't bring himself to answer it. It's his boss, wondering where he ran off to. Horibe stay home, locked away, hunched over on the floor below his poster of Ai. The transformation is complete. He isn't just living as Ai anymore. He has somehow become Ai. He quietly whistles the song as he slowly straightens up his new body. (Horibe will now be played by the same woman playing Ai, as they are identical. However, for simplicities sake this summary will still refer to him as “Horibe” and “he.”)

The Kyuugoku no Ai is not yet fulfilled...

Ai herself is still working hard at the song, though she is still no better than “not bad.” Bando takes her to dinner after a long day of recording. Mrs. Bando walks the streets alone. She watches the two of them in the restaurant stoically, but she's gone before they leave. Bando drives Ai home, and before she gets out she starts to say, “I think I'm in...” Bando takes this as an admission of love for him and he firmly turns her down. He lets her out of the car at her apartment.

Instead of going home, however, she goes to the convenience store. The boss sees her and thinks he's seen her face a lot but he can't quite place it. Ai asks after Horibe. The boss tells her Horibe's been weird lately, something about a surplus of female hormones. Ai gets his address and goes to Horibe's home. She leaves the boss alone in the store, staring absentmindedly at the poster and wondering where he's seen that girl before.

Ai knocks on Horibe's door. When Horibe asks “Who's there?” Ai is confused to hear a woman's voice. Horibe says that Horibe doesn't live there, despite the door having his nameplate. He claims his name is Asaka Ai. Ai says she's also Asaka Ai. Horibe opens the door and they both look at each other's identical faces.

Bando parks his car at home and goes inside. Mrs. Bendo is standing at window and watching. As soon as she sees him coming, she leaves into the kitchen so he won't see she's been watching the street, waiting for him to come home. She asks him if he's hungry, but he says he already ate and just wants a big glass of water. The bath is ready for him if he wants one right away. Mrs. Bendo comments that he's been so happy lately. It's just like eight years ago when he was agent for a girl named Michiru. Michiru was killed right before her big break, and they never found the killer. Mrs. Bendo then warns him that something will happen to the girl he's working with now, too.

Horibe is making tea as Ai sits down on the couch and stares at the fish, marveling that they're exactly like the ones she had before she moved. In fact, the entire apartment is exactly like the one she used to have. Horibe brushes her off, saying it's only a coincidence, but Ai doesn't buy it. Horibe then starts softly singing Yume Nara Samete, which unsettles Ai. He won't tell her where he heard it. Ai wants to know why Horibe has her name and lives exactly like her. He replies, “Because I am Asaka Ai... but I am not you.” The difference, he explains, is that Ai is greedy and stole the song from Hiromi, rather than Hiromi having written it for her. Then Ai pushed Hiromi off the roof. We see a shot of Hiromi on the edge of the building again. This time, though, instead of falling two hands shove her over the edge. The same shot of her falling is shown, and now we see she left the CD behind on the ledge. Ai picks it up. Horibe says that Ai wanted the song but Hiromi wouldn't give it to her, so Ai killed her. This talk upsets Ai. She gets up to leave. Before she goes, Horibe assures Ai he won't tell anyone else about it, though he warns her that she'll never be able to sing that song.

The next day when Bando picks Ai up, she's wearing a mask over her nose and mouth. She's sick, and because of that her voice is shot. Sure enough, at the studio, her voice is worse than “not bad.” It's just awful. Bando stops the recording session early and tells her to go home. Ai goes to the waterfront and cries. Behind her, Horibe approaches. Ai turns around and sees him. “I told you you couldn't sing it,” he says. “You will never sing it.” Then he slowly disappears.

Bando warns Ai that if she doesn't get better by next week, they will have lost their chance at making her a pop idol. They won't be able to afford any more studio time, and the commercial deadline will have passed. At home Ai is coughing terribly. She can't sing at all, and she can hardly get off the futon. Horibe watches her from the street, reminding her that she can't sing the song. Only the real Asaki Ai can, and that's him. Ai still insists she didn't do anything wrong.

The movie flashes back a third time to that day on the roof. Ai is handing Hiromi a CD, telling her it's the best song she's given her so far. Hiromi is pleased and says that she's glad to hear that, so she'll sing the song herself. As Hiromi is the one who fell in love and eloped, so it's only fair that she's the one who records the song and becomes the pop idol. “I take it all back. The idea where I write songs and you sing them, that's gone.” Ai is crushed, but she says she understands and wishes Hiromi luck.

Hiromi stops Ai as she leaves and says she wasn't serious. She would like to, but the only thing she's good at is helping Ai with her dream. She tells Ai she's about to die. She wanted to write a song about adultery, but she didn't know what adultery was like. That's why she eloped with the homeroom teacher. But then she fell in love with him for real, and now she can't live with the wounds the affair left. She drops the CD, jumps over the barrier, stands on the edge of the building for a second, and then falls over.

Back in the present, Horibe is still singing that song softly, standing on the street and watching the apartment. Mrs. Bando is walking along the street. She sees Horibe, as Ai, standing on the street and singing. Mrs. Bando runs up to him, pulls a knife out of her purse, and stabs him. “Just die!” she hisses before running off, leaving Horibe to die alone in the street. As life leaves him, his body morphs back to the way it was.

The song starts again, the way the instruments will sound in the final version. Ai is no longer sick, and her voice is stronger than ever as she records the lines that drove her friend to suicide. Bando sits outside the booth and listens. “That's right. That's the spirit. I'll turn you into a pop idol,” he promises. As the song plays in full for the third time, the credits roll.