There's a ritual for visiting graves and pouring water is part of it, towards the end. You serve water to the deceased so they won't be thirsty in the afterlife.

@RainingBullets said:

There's a ritual for visiting graves and pouring water is part of it, towards the end. You serve water to the deceased so they won't be thirsty in the afterlife.

ah OK, so nothing to do with weather, when they said you must be hot, i guess they meant he must be thirsty, in China they do same but put glass of wine on grave

I got the feeling that this is NOT normal behavior for a Japanese family. Notice how often the word "normal" is thrown around (usually with deep irony/sarcasm). I think this dysfunctional family was presented as an extreme example, almost a satire of family life like in the famous old plays "Long Day's Journey into Night" or "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf", if you've read or seen those. This is the first time I've ever seen a Japanese version of such a dysfunctional family gathering.

At the same time, there's an interesting line the son says as they're walking back from the grave the 1st time that sheds light on the film's meaning. He says something like "These days, we’re not so abnormal." That tells me the message of the film might be that these horrible people actually reflect the changing values and attitudes in Japanese society--or at least the increasingly bitter attitudes of the older generation toward younger people (not limited to Japan unfortunately). Really all of the horrible behavior is coming from the judgmental grandfather & passive-aggressive grandmother. While Ryo, his wife and his little boy represent saner minds who tolerantly bear the brunt of the older generation's bitterness. Fantastic movie.

I always had the impression that in the past a DIL was treated badly by the MIL because of tradition. I found this 'blurb' at a website explaining 'Japanese families & their traditions':

"Wife and Mother-in-Law Relationship in Japan Traditionally, when a man moved into his parent’s house with his wife, his wife was expected to be a kind of servant to her mother-in-law and in some cases couldn't even leave the house without her mother-in-law’s permission. This naturally created a lot of friction and wives have traditionally not liked their mother-laws."

@bratface said:

I always had the impression that in the past a DIL was treated badly by the MIL because of tradition.

True, that part did reek of "tradition", especially the way the wife took it with a smile, only speaking up privately to her husband at the end (after a few too many drinks).

I think the worst cruelty was the way they tortured the poor kid who was saved by the dead brother. Even before the grandmother admitted it, it was pretty clear that they only invited him so they could humiliate him. Sorta like a "Dinner for Schmucks" scenario. The whole weekend seemed like a passive-aggressive torture session. Like the way the grandmother forces everyone to listen to that song that the grandfather cheated on her with. It's really almost a dark comedy.

@rooprect said:

@bratface said:

I always had the impression that in the past a DIL was treated badly by the MIL because of tradition.

True, that part did reek of "tradition", especially the way the wife took it with a smile, only speaking up privately to her husband at the end (after a few too many drinks).

I think the worst cruelty was the way they tortured the poor kid who was saved by the dead brother. Even before the grandmother admitted it, it was pretty clear that they only invited him so they could humiliate him. Sorta like a "Dinner for Schmucks" scenario. The whole weekend seemed like a passive-aggressive torture session. Like the way the grandmother forces everyone to listen to that song that the grandfather cheated on her with. It's really almost a dark comedy.

I wasn't really addressing the movie (I haven't seen it), I was trying to answer the question of whether or not it was common for a DIL to be treated badly by her inlaws.