M.R. Dowsing's Blog

Obscure Japanese Film #258

ThisToei production is a sequel to The Shogun and His Mistressesof the same year, and I recommend reading my review of that filmfirst, even though this one has an entirely separate story.

It’snow 1786 and the 10th shogun, Ieharu (Masao Mishima), isin power. Ochisa (Tomoko Ogawa), the adopted daughter of Lord Abe(Eitaro Ozawa), is sent to serve the shogun at Edo Castle, where herolder sister Oshino (Hiroko Sakuramachi) is one of the shogun’sconcubines. It’s not long before Ochisa is forced into the sameposition, but the sisters try not to become enemies despite thebitchy machinations of the other women around them. However, when theshogun suddenly drops dead of a heart attack, Ochisa finds herselfsent to a nunnery with the other concubines, where they’re expectedto spend the rest of their lives praying for Ieharu’s soul. Thehead nun (Chieko Hagashiyama) ensures that the women are cut off fromthe outside world with the result that one goes mad, another turns tolesbianism and a third starts an affair with a priest – but whatwill become of Ochisa?

Droppingthe anthology structure of the first film and released just threemonths later, it’s no surprise that this rushed-into-production sequel is weaker,especially as it relies on an inexperienced actor to carry it – inher first leading role, 18-year-old Tomoko Ogawa was a last-minutereplacement for Yoshiko Sakuma (who reportedly objected to what shesaw as an increasing sexual emphasis, although the finished productis probably tamer than the first). As if this were not challengingenough, Ochisa is not a terribly interesting character in the firstplace, although she does eventually reveal another dimension towardsthe end and Ogawa does a fair job under the circumstances. However,although her performance was well-received and Toei planned to starher in further similar pictures, disappointing box office led them toinsist that she do nude scenes from then on, causing her to quitfilms and turn to singing, where she found considerable success.Incidentally, Yoshiko Sakuma was not the only one to be replaced –shooting began with Michiko Saga as the older sister, but sheapparently got in a strop due to too much waiting around and leftafter three days, forcing Toei to replace her with HirokoSakuramachi.

Castingshenanigans aside, this is still a decent movie, and one which alsobenefits from the splendidly villainous presence of Ko Nishimura, whoinstigates an impressively bloody sword fight with multiple opponentsat the film’s climax. Composer Sei Ikeno’s score might have beenbetter suited to a horror movie, but it’s not ineffective, whiledirector Sadao Nakajima (who also made the previous film) is adept atextracting the maximum amount of drama from every scene. The originalscreenplay by Takeo Kunihiro and Takehiro Nakajima might seem toosimilar to the original at first, but goes off in some interestingdirections before finally revealing its surprising theme of anindividual rebelling against the oppressive feudal system. Unusually,in this case, the turning worm is no put-upon samurai, but aconcubine who has finally had enough of having no say in her owndestiny.

DVD at Toei Video (no English subtitles)

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Obscure Japanese Film #257

This late film by the prolificwriter-director Kaneto Shindo (best known for his 1964 picture,Onibaba) tells the story of Taiji Tonoyama, an actor whoappeared in most of Shindo’s films before his death at the age of73 in 1989. Tonoyama was a short, prematurely bald Yoda lookalikewith sad, baggy eyes, so he was usually to be found among thesupporting casts of the many films he appeared in, in roles ofvarious sizes – the only leading roles played by him that I’maware of were in two Shindo films: The Naked Island (1960) andthe previously-reviewed Libido (1967).

Shindorecreates scenes from the actor’s life with Naoto Takenaka asTonoyama, placing the focus on his relationships with his first wife,Asako (Hideko Yoshida), and second wife, Kimie (Keiko Oginome), whomhe meets when he is 36 and still married to Asako and Kimie is 17 andworking as a waitress. Tonoyama was an unlikely womaniser and we alsosee him picking up various barmaids with apparent ease whilesimultaneously fighting a lifelong battle with the demon drink.Shindo intersperses these dramatisations with scenes from the filmsthey made together and a straight-to-camera interview with NobukoOtowa, Shindo’s mistress and eventual wife who frequently actedalongside Tonoyama (Otowa died in 1994, so Shindo must have beensitting on this for at least 6 years). Towards the end, there is alsosome very brief interview footage with fellow directors ShoheiImamura, Hiromichi Horikawa and Seijiro Koyama.

Shindohad already written a book about Tonoyama, who had also written anumber of books himself, notably a 1966 volume whose title translatesas The Irresponsible Ramblings of a Third-Rate Actor(unsurprisingly, these have notmade it into English).WhileI’ve long been a fan of Tonoyama myself, I’m not really sure thatShindo has done his memory a lot of favours by making this film.AlthoughNaoto Takenaka’sperformance seems a pretty good Tonoyama impression for the firstcouple of minutes, he goes on to deliver every line with exactly thesame throaty, drawn-out intonation, and it gets old fast. Thefilm is also way too long at over two hours – a one-hourdocumentary would have been far more preferable in my view,especially as the end result feels so superficial and sentimental,withthe repetitive piano and violin music-by-numbers score deliveringthe coup de grâce towhat is easily the weakest Shindo film I’ve seen.

Anote on the title:

Thefilm is frequently listed as ‘By Player’ in English, but I’msure this was never an official release title. It’s alsomeaningless, and I can only assume that somebody somewhere came upwith ‘bit player’ as a translation for ‘sanmon yakusha’ andsomehow managed to confuse ‘bit’ with ‘by’.

DVD at Amazon Japan (no English subtitles)

English subtitles at Open Subtitles

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Obscure Japanese Film #256

A group of five criminals headedby Utsugi (Jun Tazaki) plan to steal diamonds worth 360 million yenin an armed robbery in Kobe, but when they make the attempt, theydiscover that another gang has had the same idea, and a shoot-outensues. The other gang, headed by Koshiba (Makoto Sato), make offwith the diamonds, but Koshiba is wounded by a gunshot in theprocess. They hide out in an abandoned garage while one gang member,Jiro (Tetsuo Ishidate), goes off to kidnap a young woman, Tsunako(Yuki Nakagawa), threatening to kill her unless her surgeon father(Takashi Shimura) operates on Koshiba. Meanwhile, both Utsugi’sgang and the police are on their trail, and private detective Kuroki(Akira Takarada) is following Koshiba’s girlfriend, Rie (KumiMizuno), in the hopes of getting the diamonds and selling them to theinsurance company…

Likethe previously-reviewed Brand of Evil from the same year, thisis a co-production between Takarazuka Eiga and Toho. It’s alsoa similarly noir-ish vision featuring shadowy, high-contrastcinematography with lots of skewed angles, a cool jazz score andmostly unsympathetic characters. Strangely, this one also evokesmemories of Reservoir Dogs, in this case because of itsheist-gone-awry plot in which one gang member is shot and has to holeup in an abandoned building, together with a climax in whicheveryone’s pointing guns at each other. It seems highly unlikelythat Tarantino could have seen either film before making his debut,though, so this is probably all pure coincidence.

Inmy view, this is a more satisfying film than Brand as it has aless convoluted plot and doesn’t outstay its welcome. It looksgreat thanks to cameraman Shinsaku Uno (who also shot KihachiOkamoto’s splendid Aa bakudan), while jazz guitarist ShungoSawada’s score sounds pretty good even if it’s not especiallymemorable. The acting is decent although a couple of the actorsplaying the more junior gang members go a bit OTT. I found KumiMizuno especially effective playing a woman not about to let any manget the better of her, and it’s great to see Takashi Shimura notwasted for a change – here, he has a substantial supporting part asthe doctor losing confidence in his abilities because age is catchingup with him. However, the top-billed star is Akira Takarada, who madehis name playing the hero in the original Godzilla (1954). Hewas never very highly-rated as an actor, but actually acquits himselfquite well cast against type as the private eye who’s little betterthan the criminals he’s pursuing. Makoto Sato, whose ownlimitations were sometimes exposed when playing a leading role, alsogives a strong performance as the worst of the bad guys.

Thedirector, Jun Fukuda, was to become best-known for his monster moviessuch as Ebirah, Terror of the Deep (1966) and Godzilla vs.Mechagodzilla (1974) but is known to have despised the genre andseen it merely as a way to make a living. Working from an efficientoriginal screenplay by Ei Ogawa and Moriyuki Mafuji, in this film hemakes excellent use of real locations in a similar way to Hideo Goshain movies such as Cash Calls Hell (1966), suggesting thatFukuda’s career could have gone quite differently had he startedout a few years earlier.

Originallyscreened as a double feature with the previously-reviewed Naked Executive.

Watchedwith dodgy subtitles.

DVD at Amazon Japan (no English subtitles)

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Obscure Japanese Film #255

Narasaki(Shin Saburi) has married Katsuko (Setsuko Hara), the widow of asoldier who got killed fighting alongside Narasaki in the Philippinesand who left her with a son, Hiroshi. However, it was a marriage ofconvenience and there’s been little intimacy between the two –her husband is suffering from PTSD and suppressing his emotions,so he often comes across as a bit of a cold fish. One of Narasaki’sfriends is Ohira (Toshiro Mifune), a less damaged veteran who findshimself attracted to Katsuko. Emotionally starved as she is, shefinds herself falling for him despite her moral qualms...

ThisToho production was based on a story entitled Kono ju-nen(‘These 10 Years’) by Hidemi Kon (1903-84), who had himself beenstationed in the Philippines during the war. It was adapted byToshiro Ide, a notable screenwriter who worked for many of Japan’stop directors, but is perhaps best-known for his frequentcollaborations with Mikio Naruse, whose films this one somewhatresembles. On this occasion, however, the director is none other thanstar actor Shin Saburi, whom I’ve often criticised in previousreviews for being wooden. After seeing this film, he’s definitelygone up in my estimation as, not only does he give a betterperformance than usual – indeed, there are times you could almostswear that he’s alive – but he also does a highly creditable jobof direction. This was actually the 11th of 14 films hedirected, though I’ve yet to see any of the others.

Saburialso gets excellent performances out of the rest of the cast,although considering that – apart from Setsuko Hara and ToshiroMifune – this also includes Keiju Kobayashi, Murasaki Fujima andKaoru Yachigusa, they may not have needed too much help. Mifune mightseem an unlikely romantic lead but, reunited with Hara after theirsuccessful pairing in Tokyo Sweetheart (1952), he again showsthat he was quite capable of giving a good performance in anon-aggressive role. However, top-billed Hara is the real star of theshow here and for her part she demonstrates a wide range of subtleexpressions that her work for Ozu rarely allowed her.

Asidefrom being a strong love story for grown-ups which offers nofairy-tale endings or easy solutions, the film is also an insightfulportrait of post-war Japanese life, the story taking place inflashbacks over a period of 10 years from the end of the war untilwhat was then the present day. We witness the lives of the variouscharacters change greatly during this period, especially in economicterms – immediately after the war, they’re all livinghand-to-mouth, but some prove able to adapt to new circumstances verysuccessfully and become quite wealthy within just a few years, whileothers (like Narasaki) are, to their detriment, unable to let go ofthe past and seem bewildered by the sudden dramatic social changes.Meanwhile, the Americans are a constant background presencethroughout – jeeps rumble through the streets and military jets flyover, startling everyone with their sudden noise. Such sights arecommon in films of the period, and this one in particular shows thatthe war and its aftermath continued to affect the lives of everyonein the country in all sorts of subtle ways.

Apleasant surprise, then, and a film well-worth seeking out.

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Obscure Japanese Film #254

Kimura (Shinjiro Ebara) is ayoung stoker on the railway saving up to marry Yukiko (Satomi Oka),His best friend, Maeda (Tatsuya Nakadai), also works for the railwaybut is an unhappy man with a reputation for skiving, drinking andgambling. When a colleague’s money goes missing, Maeda is the mainsuspect and the workers give him a beating until Kimura intervenesand stops it. Later, Maeda asks Kimura to lend him some money, butwon’t say what for – Kimura at first refuses, then relents andhands all his savings over to Maeda. Yukiko is furious when she findsout and persuades Kimura that Maeda must have lost it all betting onthe bicycle races…

Setin the fictional town of Haginomiya but shot in Utsunomiya, north ofTokyo, this Toei production is the only film to have been based on anovel by the obscure Kazutoshi Himuro. Adapted for the screen by theubiquitous Kaneto Shindo, it was directed by Miyoji Ieki. Unlike manyof Ieki’s better-known films, none of the main characters arechildren, but otherwise this is fairly typical of his oeuvre in beinga work of leftist social realism shot on real locations. Something Idon’t remember seeing before in an Ieki film, however, is anaccomplished action scene like the one we get here when there’s afault with the train and Kimura has to climb outside while it’sstill moving in order to fix it.

Toeicontract player Shinjiro Ebara had played his first lead in TadashiImai’s Rice the year before and went on to marry hisco-star, Hitomi Nakahara (aptly nicknamed ‘Bambi’), in 1960. Shealso appears here as Yukiko’s younger sister. In his hands, Kimuraseems quite dull at first and perhaps the filmmakers realised that hewas failing to make much of an impression – around 50 minutes in,there’s a scene in which, completely out of the blue, he burstsinto a quite extraordinary solo a capella song and dance to which headds frenzied percussion by slapping himself and anything else nearat hand. This is followed by a scene in which he does something weirdwith his shirt and gives an impassioned speech at a meeting, none ofwhich seemed thinkable from the Kimura featured in the film’s firsthalf. Well, I guess at least nobody was going to accuse him of givinga boring performance after all that...

Less than a year away from stardom, Tatsuya Nakadai’s screen time is quite limited and he’snot yet the assured actor he would soon become as a result of working on The HumanCondition. There’s a mystery about his character which is quiteintriguing, but ultimately his role feels underwritten, although thismay well be the only film in which you’ll see him break down andsob uncontrollably.

TheNaked Sun was entered into the 1959 Berlin InternationalFilm Festival, where it won the Youth Film Award for Best FeatureFilm Suitable for Young People. This is perhaps a little surprisingconsidering that it was a West Berlin festival in those days andNaked Sun seems like a film that would have been more popularwith the Communists in the Eastern sector. However, in this case theworkers only grumble a bit about their pay and conditions and aregenerally shown as quite a cheerful and hard-working bunch.

Thefilm was ranked 5th best of the year by Kinema Jumpomagazine, the top four being, respectively, Kinoshita’s The Balladof Narayama, Kurosawa’s The Hidden Fortress, Ozu’sEquinox Flower and Ichikawa’s Conflagration (alsofeaturing Nakadai). I’m a little surprised to see it ranked sohighly myself but, while I wouldn’t call the film a masterpiece,it’s certainly an interesting and likeable picture and not just fortrain buffs.

Thanksto A.K.

DVD at Amazon Japan (no English subtitles)

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Obscure Japanese Film #253

An unnamed 51-year-old man (TaijiTonoyama) suffering from some kind of nervous breakdown isrecuperating in a mental hospital when he learns about the death ofan old friend. Feeling depressed, he wants to prove to himself thathe’s still alive, so he tries to have sex with the young femalepatient he’s sharing a room with (Kayo Matsuo). She’s not toopleased about this when she wakes up to find him on top of her, soshe fights him off and runs for the doctor (Naoyuki Kanno akaTadahiko Sugano). When the doctor arrives, he tells the man he has toleave immediately. The man’s wife (Nobuko Otowa) comes to take himhome and, although dismayed by what her husband has done, she remainssurprisingly sympathetic.

Thecouple have a son (Hideki Hayashi) and daughter (Miyoko Akaza) intheir late teens who pay little attention to their usually meekfather. However, when the son learns from the doctor what his fatherhas done, he decides to track down the female patient and attempt toseduce her himself…

Writer-directorKaneto Shindo throws any pretence at realism out of the window here –of course, no mental hospital would have a male and female patientsharing the same private room, and there are numerous other issuesone could take with the story, but he seems entirely unconcerned withsuch matters here. One matter he does seem concerned with is thegenerational differences he perceives regarding male-femalerelationships. Throughout the film, Shindo contrasts the relationshipbetween the father and his wife with that of the developing onebetween the son and the young woman, and seems to be suggesting thatthe son believes himself to have the upper hand, but doesn’t –although he may have the strength to make a woman submit physically,that’s all he has, and it’s she who retains power over him.However, this is not really what stays with you at the end of thefilm.

RegularShindo collaborators composer Hikaru Hayashi and cinematographerKiyomi Kuroda help to make both the sound and visuals of this typically eccentric work consistentlyinteresting throughout. At times, the film plays like a comedy, andcertainly parts of it are quite funny, the comic highlight being whenTonoyama has to give a guided tour to the world’s most taciturn man(Hideo Kanze). Ultimately, though, this is not a film likely to leaveanyone smiling, and perhaps the laughter is supposed to catch in ourthroats as we see the apparently ridiculous protagonist struggling tocome to grips with ageing, failure and mortality, while his wife’sdevotion remains unshakeable. So, while it appears that Shindo setout to make a film with a sexual theme, it becomes more concernedwith the father’s mid-life crisis (which, admittedly, is partly dueto his impotence, yet not in merely sexual terms). However, it’salso possible that this was what Shindo intended all along, and thesex angle was simply a means of selling the film to the public –the poster promised Awakened sexuality! Lost sexuality! Agroundbreaking and controversial film from the genius directorShindo, known for Instinct!A film exploring humanity through the theme of ‘sex’. (Instinctrefers toShindo’s previous film, which was also known as Honnoor Lost Sex, so itseems that that filmmust have been successful at the box office in Japan anyway.)

TaijiTonoyama, who was indeed 51 at the time but looked older, hadco-founded the production company (Kindai Eiga Kyokai) which madethis film together with Shindo and Kozaburo Yoshimura in 1950.Tonoyama appeared in most of Shindo’s films, but – being a short,bald man with sad, bulging eyes – he rarely had such a substantialone as this and its great to see him featured more prominently for achange. He has a staggering 346 credits on IMDb and is probablybest-remembered for another rare lead he played in Shindo’s NakedIsland (1960). He died in 1989, but Shindo liked him so much thathe subsequently wrote a book about him, which he followed with afeature film Sanmon yakusha (2000). The title means‘third-rate actor’ which is how Tonoyama had referred to himselfin the title of his own 1966 book, which translates as TheIrresponsible Ramblings of a Third-Rate Actor.

Bonustrivia:

Thetitle sequence featuring lava lamp bubbles was designed by the famousartist Taro Okamoto, who also did the titles for Shindo’s Mother(1963), Onibaba (1964) and Yoshida’s Escape from Japan(1964).

Thanksto A.K.

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Obscure Japanese Film #252

1943. Shigeru (Ryoji Hayama) is astudent returning from Tokyo to his hometown of Toyooka in HyogoPrefecture on western Honshu (then part of the San’in region).There, he will have a farewell party before going off to war, butmost of all he hopes to see his childhood sweetheart, Tsubura (IzumiAshikawa), who has been unable to walk since contracting polio at anearly age. This has caused her to be largely housebound and liverather like one of the dolls in glass boxes we see in her home.

Onthe train, Shigeru replays memories from their childhood when, as aboy (played by Hayama’s own kid brother, Kunio Yamaguchi), he wouldvisit her and her kindly mother (Sachiko Murase), while her sternfather (Jukichi Uno) looked on disapprovingly. Shigeru would often stopoff at the tofu shop, where the girl, Tokie (Miori Karuhata), wasjealous of his love for Tsubura. One day, she lured him into the backand seduced him despite the fact that he was yet to reach puberty(the film later backtracks on this somewhat and suggests that theydid not go all the way).

Tsuburagives Shigeru three stones in a pouch, which he carries with himthroughout the war. When he finally returns, it’s on the very daythat she’s to be married to the local villain, Tachio (NobuoKaneko), who had previously run off with Tokie before abandoning herafter six months. Now, he’s taken advantage of Tsubura and hermother’s hardship after her father’s death and pressured her intomarriage in order to improve his social status. When Shigeru tries tovisit her, Tachio won’t even let him in the house, so there’slittle he can do but accept the situation. As he walks offdespondently, he runs into Tokie (now played by Misako Watanabe), whois now working as a bar hostess (and, it’s implied, is also engagedin some form of prostitution). Initially, she tries to seduce himagain, but he’s still too much in love with Tsubura. When Tokie is offered a job keeping the books for Tachio, she becomes ago-between for Shigeru and Tsubura, delivering messages between thetwo. Meanwhile, although it’s always been assumed that Tsubura isunable to have sex, she finally has her first period – somethingher mother hopes to keep secret from Tachio, who has begun bringingprostitutes home and forcing Tsubura to watch while he has sex withthem...

This Nikkatsu production wasbased on the debut novel of Shigeo Fujii (1916-79), who worked inmagazine editing and had managed to get it published as a magazineserial the year before. According to Japanese Wikipedia, it ‘washighly praised by Yasunari Kawabata and nominated for the AkutagawaPrize’. When Nikkatsu bought the rights, he quit his day job anddevoted himself full time to writing. Wikipedia also notes that,‘During his lifetime, he believed that, "If I have saké, Idon't need anything else." His clumsy and impulsivepersonality made him feared by editors, and sometimes even made themdislike him.’ Three further films (all obscure B-movies) wereadapted from his work, but he’s remained unknown outside Japan. Likehis protagonist, Fujii was also from Toyooka and apparently coachedthe actors in the local dialect. Unfortunately, I have to say that Ifound the story to be a contrived and excessively sentimental one,though it seems that such fare was eagerly lapped up by quite a largepart of the Japanese cinemagoing audience at the time.

Theemerging new wave filmmakers of the era, on the other hand, hadlittle patience for this kind of material and, although the sexualfrankness of the piece is something you wouldn’t see in a Hollywoodpicture of this era, it sits awkwardly in what is at heart anold-fashioned (even for its day) tearjerker. As I’ve come to expectfrom director Eisuke Takizawa, the film is very well-made and it’shard to find fault with the direction, only in what is (to me,anyway) the poor choice of material.

Interms of the cast, nominal star Izumi Ashikawa first appears 33minutes in (the childhood prologue is a lengthy one) and I almostfelt sorry for her in being stuck with such a role – Tsubura is soridiculously self-sacrificing it’s actually kind of annoying. Forhis part, Jukichi Uno manages to escape his nice guy image brieflyand play a bit of a bastard pretty well (intriguingly, his name doesnot appear on the poster, whereas Chishu Ryu’s does, suggestingthat Uno took his role; perhaps it was felt that the gentle father ofthe Ozu films would not be accepted in such a part). However, thebest performance comes from Misako Watanabe, who makes the perhapsunlikely character of Tokie feel more like a real human being thananyone else manages to do here. Watanabe, who won a Blue Ribbon Awardfor her performance in Shohei Imamura’s Endless Desire thefollowing year and is also a well-respected stage actress, is stillwith us at the time of writing at 93 and has been acting as recentlyas 2024.

DVD at Amazon Japan (no English subtitles)

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Obscure Japanese Film #251

Atsuko (Hideko Takamine) is ayoung woman living at home with her mother (Hisako Takihana) andnephew Kenichi (Katsumasa Okamoto), whose father was killed in thewar and whose mother (Kuniko Miyake) works at a hotel in Hakone.Kenichi has become very attached to a stray dog he adopted but whichhis mother disapproves of due to its habit of stealing theneighbours’ shoes (the implication is that Kenichi feels ratherlike a stray dog himself). Atsuko works at a small trading company,where one of her ambitious male colleagues, Kaji (Eiji Okada), hasdeveloped a crush on her. One day she meets the less serious Inoda(Ryo Ikebe), who has befriended Kenichi and works for a largertrading company, and the two hit it off. However, Kaji’s jealousy,together with a dispute between the two rival companies over aclient, threatens to destroy their burgeoning romance…

Distributedby Shintoho, this was the second production by director HeinosukeGosho’s independent production company Studio 8. It was based on anovel of the same name by Jun Takami (1907-65), whose work alsoprovided the basis for the previously-reviewed Love in theMountains (1959), a similarly modest and sentimental love storyabout ordinary people.

Althoughthis was far from star Hideo Takamine’s most interesting role, sheand Ryo Ikebe make for an appealing pair as they search the post-warrubble of Asakusa in search of Kenichi after he runs away –Asakusa, most of which had been destroyed by bombs, was evidently notyet fully rebuilt in 1952, the final year of American occupation.Incidentally, Takamine speaks English in several scenes here as thecompany Atsuko works for does most of its business with foreigners.Her modern, independent personality and ability to do her job well isnot always appreciated by her male colleagues, including Kaji. whoare at times quite condescending towards her.

Thefilm is full of quietly effective little moments, such as when Inodatakes a break on the stairwell with his colleague, looks down to seethe cleaning woman on the floor below, then turns to look up at thesun shining through the window; although the influence of Westernculture is apparent everywhere in the lives of these characters, suchmundane details feel a long way from Hollywood.

Amongthe supporting cast, the best-known face is that of future AkiraKurosawa favourite Kyoko Kagawa, who appears here briefly as a nun.

Thecopy I watched was a low-res VHS transfer viewable on YouTube here,but I assume the Japanese DVD is better quality. English subtitlescourtesy of Coralsundy can be found here.

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Obscure Japanese Film #250

Jiro(Tatsuya Nakadai), the manager of a pool hall owned by Asai (MasaoMishima), has been having an affair with Masako (Chikage Awashima)since her wealthy engineer husband went to oversee a constructionproject in Vietnam two years earlier. The husband in question,Riichiro (Fujio Suga), also happens to be Jiro’s cousin. When hereturns from abroad, it becomes very difficult for the lovers tocontinue meeting, especially as Riichiro is not only a jealous andsuspicious type, but has a short fuse to boot.

Meanwhile,Asai wants to sell the pool hall and Jiro wants to buy it but lacksthe funds. He also has little time to find them as the local yakuzawant to buy the place, but then he thinks of a clever solution to hisproblems. This will involve both seducing a waitress, Miyoko(Onibaba’s Jitsuko Yoshimura), and getting Riichiro to usehis explosive temper against himself. But will Jiro be able to stayone step ahead of dogged police detective Kikuchi? (This latter isplayed by Junzaburo Ban, who played a similar character in the sameyear’s A Fugitive from the Past.)

ThisToho production was based on the 1949 novel Heaven Ran Last byWilliam P. McGivern (1918-82), who also wrote the novels on whichFritz Lang’s The Big Heat (1953) and Robert Wise’s OddsAgainst Tomorrow (1959) were based. Heaven Ran Last,though, was neverfilmed by Hollywood and, like Kurosawa basing High and Low(1963) on Ed McBain’s novel King’s Ransom, it’s anindication of how much American pulp was being translated intoJapanese in the post-war years that it came to the attention ofdirector Hiromichi Horikawa. In this case, apart from transferringthe story from America to Japan, screenwriters Zenzo Matsuyama andIchiro Ikeda have stuck pretty closely to the book – too closely,perhaps, according to some Japanese reviewers who have commented thatthe characters don’t behave like Japanese people. In any case, Ifound it to be one of the better plots I’ve seen in this type offilm as the twists don’t become too far-fetched, as is so often thecase.

Severalof the same talents from Horikawa’s excellent 1963 noir Shiro tokuro (‘White and Black’, aka Pressure of Guilt)returned for this one, including Japan’s top film composer ToruTakemitsu as well as cast members Chikage Awashima, Masao Mishima,Eijiro Tono and, of course, star Tatsuya Nakadai. The LastJudgment makes an excellent vehicle for Nakadai, who looks verycool driving around in an MG Roadster in his shades and fur-linedjacket and is obviously having a field day being very bad indeed.However, Jiro is saved from becoming a one-dimensional villain notonly by Nakadai’s charismatic performance but the fact that his love forMasako, at least, does seem to be genuine.

Oneof the great things about Takemitsu as a composer was that he knewwhen to shut up, an all-too-rare talent which is well in evidencehere, while Horikawa makes excellent use of industrial noises toheighten the tension in a number of scenes. Another plus is the dark,shadowy cinematography of Tokuzo Kuroda. All in all, The LastJudgment is a very satisfying noir that has been kept in the darkfor far too long.

Thanksto A.K.

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Obscure Japanese Film #249

Mitsuko (Hibari Misora) is ahomeless child who hangs around with the day labourers at the docksin the Sakuragicho district of Yokohama. They look after her and shekeeps them entertained by singing, for which she has a remarkabletalent. Mitsuko dresses as a boy, but it’s never explained whetherthis is simply because it was easier for her to get hold of boy’sclothes or for some other reason. However, she is soon adopted anddressed in girl’s clothes by a waitress named Kyoko (KeikoTsushima) and her father, Osamu (Ichiro Sugai), a classical violinistreduced to busking to make a living.

Meanwhile,Mitsuko’s older brother, Kenzo (Yasumi Hara), a musician, hasfinally made it back to Yokohama after being posted overseas duringthe war and is searching for his sister but has also become involvedin a smuggling racket. One night he runs into Osamu, who is extremelydrunk and singing a song which Kenzo wrote but never published. Kenzoknows that Osamu could only have heard the song from Mitsuko, butOsamu is too intoxicated to provide any useful information. WhenOsamu subsequently goes blind as a result of drinking bootleg liquorcontaining methanol, Kyoko’s efforts to raise money to pay hismedical bills result in her being forced into helping the same gangof smugglers that Kenzo is involved with...

Althoughit lacks big Hollywood-style production numbers, this Shochikuproduction has enough songs that it certainly qualifies as a musical.It was based on a story by the prolific Toshihiko Takeda (1891-1961),whose work also provided the basis for Tomu Uchida’s Policeman(1933) and Hiroshi Shimizu’s Why Did These Women Become LikeThis? (1956). It was the third film to be directed by MiyojiIeki, who would become known for films dealing with childhood,although this particular film has the feel of an assignment, and itsmain raison d’être was probably to function as a vehicle forsinging prodigy Hibari Misora. She was 12 at the time but looksyounger; it was her fifth film appearance but her first starringrole. Here, she comes across as a sort of Japanese Shirley Temple,which might not be entirely by chance – its worth remembering thatthe film was produced during the occupation when filmmakers neededthe approval of the American authorities. As well as Hibari’ssinging, Keiko Tsushima – a trained dancer as well as actor –also gets to strut her stuff.

Kanashikikuchibue is a contrived and sentimental tale but it’s quitewell-made and lent a little interest due to its portrayal of achaotic post-war world in which people are forced to do whatever theycan to survive.

Sungby Hibari, the title song was released about a month before the movieand became a huge hit.

DVDat Amazon Japan (no English subtitles)

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