Villon’s Wife / Viyon no tsuma (2009)

One of several movies made to mark the centennial of the famous Japanese novelist Osamu Dazai, Villon's Wife visits the post-war world in which the novel first appeared, providing a portrait of the perfect wife with a husband who doesn't deserve her. Otani is a famous writer who is also an alcoholic, as famous for …

Tokyo Profile / Portrait of a City / Tokai no yokogai (1953)

To the sound of a jaunty rumba, we see a busy street out the rear of a moving streetcar. A crowd has gathered on the sidewalk, and in the center is Toshiko, a shoe-shine girl, and Michiko, a five year old girl who has gotten separated from her mother. Ueda, a passing advertising sign carrier, …

House in the Quarter / Gobancho yugiriro (1963)

The House in the Quarter is a brothel in Kyoto where we follow the young Yuko from her first days to her last. The setting thus gives us a cross between Street of Shame and Woman of Rumor, but concentrated on one single character, like Women Are Born Twice or Twilight Story. There is no …

Innocent Witch / Woman of Osore Mountain / Osorezan no onna (1965)

Ayako's father hurts his back and can't go out fishing, so her mother resorts to the traditional solution and sells her to a local brothel. Her brief life afterward, in Gosho's subtle and fascinating Osorezan no onna, provides a penetrating look at life in a brothel and in the provincial world of pre-war Japan. At …

The Loyal 47 Ronin / Chushingura (1958)

The story of the 47 Ronin had a particular resonance for Japanese audiences, and it has been told on screen numerous times. Thus, it is no surprise to find that Daiei, the studio that was most deeply committed to the jidai-geki and chanbara in the fifties and sixties, should turn to the story for one …

In Search of Mother / Mabuta no haha (1962)

A persistent theme in Japanese movies after the war was the abandoned child. Naturally, in a society and economy all but destroyed by WWII, there would be many children either orphaned or abandoned by parents who could not feed them, and the theme  carried over into many jidai-geki of the era as well.  Mabuta no …

Repast / Meshi (1951) & Green Tea Over Rice / Ochazuke no aji (1952)

As a general rule, I intend to write about one movie at a time, but the parallels between Ozu's Green Tea Over Rice and Naruse's Meshi, made at almost the same time by two master film makers, are just too strong to ignore. Each film deals with a couple in a childless marriage, in each …

Portrait of Madame Yuki / Yuki fujin ezu (1950)

Even the most fervent admirers of Mizoguchi don't seem to know how to deal with Madame Yuki, and so for the most part it is ignored. It should not be. In outline, this is a typical josei-eiga: Yuki is a woman who has somehow been married  to the wrong man. He squanders her wealth, forcing …

Taira Clan Saga / Shin Heike monogatari (1955)

The ways of the movie studio are often unfathomable, so it is hard to know how Mizoguchi became involved in this particular movie, which is far outside his usual territory. Where almost all his previous films had dealt with women's situations, this is very much a movie about men. It is, in effect, about the …

A Geisha / Gion bayashi (1953)

A Geisha is actually two in Mizoguchi's most detailed look at the world of the post-war geisha. Ayako Wakao is a sweet sixteen girl abandoned by her father. To get away from her lecherous uncle, she begs her aunt to teach her to be a geisha like her dead mother was in the Gion,* Kyoto's …