Tokyo's Asakusa district comes alive as a maze of small streets and pockets of activity in this adaptation of a Yasunari Kawabata novel. Osome, Oren and Chieko are the daughters of an indifferent mother who lives off the proceeds of young street-corner shamisan players, one of whom is Osome herself. As the sisters try to break away into love, marriage and stage careers they seem to be dogged by the lowlife figures of their Asakusa unbringing. Audie Bock writes, "A melodrama designed for technical display but nevertheless showing Naruse's skill at characterization with three different types of girls from the same family background. He alters Kawabata's emphasis on the garishness and sleaziness of the Asakusa atmosphere somewhat in order to develop his own type of heroine in Osome: upstanding, independent, realistic yet tender. In his first talkie, full of music and effects as well as dialogue, Naruse also employs narrative techniques that are unusual for him: flashback and voice-over narration."