The Cinema of Japan: 1950-1965

Protests around Japanese Parliament building



Yoshishige Yoshida’s debut film “Good for Nothing” showed how the economy affects three different men in Japanese society: a wealthy businessman preaching free markets and free competition yet willing to lend money to his layabout drifter of a son, another low-level salaryman is so obsessed with work and bills he can’t muster up enthusiasm over becoming a father. In his next film “Blood is Dry” he satirised the advertising industry and the superficial celebrity culture in a darker vein than “Giants and Toys” with a more socio-economic grounding. Keiji Sada plays Takashi Kiguchi, his small company is planning mass lay-offs to avoid going under, driving Kiguchi to a suicide attempt in front of his co-workers, practically begging to spare his colleagues’ jobs in exchange for his own life. An insurance company gets wind of the story and offers to make him the face of their new advertising campaign based around his suicide attempt, he reluctantly agrees thanks to a lack of money. A PR expert Yuki becomes his publicity agent organising interviews and public appearances to build up his persona and her bank balance, until he starts going to meetings and interviews not on her pre-approved list. Meanwhile a jealous paparazzo intent on making a name for himself tries to dig up dirt on Kiguchi, writing smear articles and organising set ups to besmirch his wholesome image. Kiguchi’s wife on the other hand is angry at his selfish suicide attempt, once he becomes famous she dislikes his new persona. While his initial appeal as an inarticulate everyman earns him fame and money in the short-term it comes at a long-term cost: his personality becomes dependent on the adoration of his fans, he begins to regurgitate the same slogans in everyday life claiming to want to help everyone, not realising the superficiality of his fame and recognition, or the impermanence of fickle celebrity culture. At the start of the film he needed a job to feel secure, at the end he needs the approval of faceless fans to feel secure.





Two recent bank robberies leave the police completely dumbfounded, detective Okamoto (Tatsuya Mihashi) has a friendly rivalry with his reporter girlfriend Kyoko (Keiko Sata) trying to figure out who’s behind it. During a chase he stumbles across Fujichiyo (Kaoru Yachigusa), a former buyo dancer from a wealthy family ready to make a comeback. Is she linked to the bank robberies? Taking cues from Hollywood B-movie sci-fi, “The Human Vapor” ties “The Invisible Man” into a cautionary tale of science experiments gone wrong: turns out the “Gas Man” (Yoshio Tsuchiya) is a librarian who served as a fighter pilot until a cancer diagnosis forced him to quit. Upon recommendation he’s offered a chance to be a part of Japan’s Space Program to test the limits of the human body. Naturally the experiment goes wrong, the “Gas Man” becomes a murderer and bank robber to see Fujichiyo dance again. For all its cheesy special effects it’s a pretty decent B-movie in the end, building enough mystery at the start to unfurl the human story in the middle, setting up for the final showdown at the end. Ishiro Honda gets lambasted as a terrible film director, yet life-long friend Akira Kurosawa trusted him enough to be assistant director on the latter’s final 5 films.





Nagisa Oshima did not look at the lower classes through rose-tinted lenses, in “The Sun’s Burial” he shows deeply flawed individuals mired in poverty, believing the Empire will return and can be built yet wallowing in nihilism, cynicism and morally objectionable scams. In his other nihilistic film “Cruel Story of Youth” he took to the streets of Tokyo with hand-held cameras, this time Makoto (Miyuki Kuwano) enjoys riding in cars with older men for fun until one tries to molest her, thankfully Hiyoshi (Yusuke Kawazu) is on hand to beat him up and save her. After they witness the Anpo protests he takes her to a nearby river and rapes her, the two begin a psychologically damaging relationship based on a rejection of society, Makoto moves in with him to escape her sister’s lectures. To finance their lifestyle they act out their first meeting: Makoto takes a ride with an older guy inducing him to molest her, Hiyoshi steps in to save her and blackmail him. When Makoto finds out she’s pregnant he tells her to get an abortion, he sleeps with an older lover and asks her for a loan to cover the costs. The shocking and disturbing subject matter earned the director plenty of controversy upon release, it was rejected for a UK cinema certificate. Now considered an important milestone in the “Japanese New Wave” for its daring content and challenging perceived norms, it’s too rough and raw around the edges, its criticisms too direct to be an easy watch.





Taking a different look at relationships in a changing society, “Brother” is set in 1920s Japan based on a novel by Aya Koda. Hekiro (Hiroshi Kawaguchi) is a teenage boy prone to idleness, fighting, horse riding and gambling, his antics get him expelled from school. His sister Gen (Keiko Kishi) on the other hand has to do all the housework, the cooking and be the responsible one in the family: her stepmother (Kinuyo Tanaka) is bedridden with rheumatism while her father (Masayuki Mori) spends all his time writing alone. Gen’s mother complains about everything and doesn’t trust her, while Hekiro is spoiled and indulged by his father resigned to the fact “boys will be boys”, it’s certainly not a fair deal for Gen even when Hekiro tries to strangle her. As the story develops tragedy befalls Hekiro and it’s up to Gen to do her best helping him out. Centred around the high expectations of women in contrast to men and winning film of the year by Kinema Junpo magazine, “Brother” is most noted for its desaturated colour palette with high contrast thanks to an experimental colour process called “skip bleaching”, to achieve the period look for the film.





“Night and Fog in Japan” deliberately takes the title of a Holocaust documentary released a couple years earlier. The film begins with a wedding between Reiko and Nozawa, what’s meant to be a joyous occasion turns sour the moment Ota turns up berating everyone for not being as dedicated to the student protest movement as himself, using multiple flashbacks from several other wedding guests to piece together the story of the failed protest against the US-Japanese treaty. Utilising long takes and stylised photography akin to theatre, it’s a stylistic detour from the other two Oshima films made that year, the overtly political dialogue will not be for all tastes, it works far better as a study of the internal dynamics of a failed political movement. After a Socialist party politician was assassinated by a right-wing student, the movie was pulled from theatres after 3 days, prompting an angry letter from Oshima denouncing Shochiku studios for the decision, he left and set up his own independent studio.





The opening 20 minutes of “The Bad Sleep Well” is a textbook example of introducing a large number of characters and the interconnected relationships between them. A flock of reporters gather round a high-profile wedding reception, Iwabuchi (Masayuki Mori) is Vice President of Public Corporation, marrying his limping daughter Yoshiko (Kyoko Kagawa) off to secretary Nishi (Toshiro Mifune) to further the latter’s career. Iwabuchi’s son Tatsuo (Tatsuya Mihashi) is serving as master of ceremonies at the wedding reception until the Police walk in to arrest him for bribery and kickbacks. The reporters note a similar scandal several years ago involving Iwabuchi and his associates Moriyama (Takashi Shimura) and Shirai (Ko Nishimura), when Assistant Chief Furuya committed suicide to end an investigation into corruption. The wedding cake is wheeled into the room, an imitation of Public Corporation’s office building with an ‘X’ on the seventh floor, the same window Furuya threw himself out of. A noirish commentary on post-war Japan’s corporate cronyism, the film is loosely based on “Hamlet” as Nishi reveals his plans to destroy Public Corporation from within. At two and a half hours it loses a bit of steam in the middle and final thirds, some of the acting resorts to screams and squirms but as with Kurosawa some sequences including that opening are brilliant, this scene showing underling Wada witnessing his own funeral being one of them.





“Black people invented jazz, white people stole it, and now we have it, we’re the worst”, says the psychopathic protagonist Akira (Tamio Kawaji) a former juvenile delinquent with a love of “real jazz”, laughing in people’s faces and eating like a pig. The moment he’s free he joyrides with a couple friends: Masaru (Eiji Go) lives with him in a tiny shack so close to the railway it rumbles everytime a train passes, Yuki (Yuko Chiyo) “entertains” foreigners for money and laughs so often she might be part-Hyena. Akira has a bone to pick with Fumiko (Noriko Matsumoto) the girlfriend of the reporter who got him locked up, he spends most of the film intruding in her life and getting her pregnant, she oddly feels something towards him despite her engagement to a reporter. The lack of plot gives an aimless feeling matching its protagonist, while his friend Masaru wants to join a gang to make some real money. At one point Akira drops in at Fumiko’s place with all her artistic friends around, one of them describes Akira as “the perfect image of Modern Man”. The use of handheld cameras and tracking shots as characters’ point of view, the frenetic jazz soundtrack and charismatic lead performance makes “The Warped Ones” an engaging, disturbing film, the opening gives you an idea of what to expect from the rest of the film.






The home next to the river with coloured washes.

Family and money don’t mix in this colour drama from Mikio Naruse. The story of an elderly widowed mother (Aiko Mimasu), the enormous house and the lives of her grown up children wanting that inheritance. The eldest daughter Sanae (Setsuko Hara) loses her husband in an accident early on in the film and moves back home until she can find a job or another husband; eldest son Yuichiro (Masayuki Mori) is a salaryman and head of the household looking for new investments even when his siblings are asking for money; his wife Kazuko (Hideko Takamine) is the subdued homemaker taking care of their young son; the second daughter Kaoru (Mitsuko Kusabue) can’t stand living with her henpecked husband Hidetaka (Hiroshi Koizumi) and his domineering mother (Haruko Sugimura; youngest daughter Haruko (Reiko Dan) injects some energy and fun into proceedings while youngest son Reiji (Akira Takarada) is a photographer who doesn’t get along with his wife. Sometimes reminiscent of lesser Ozu with a curious soundtrack mixing classical and melodrama, “Daughters, Wives and Mother” examines the generational gap between the older and younger siblings through Sanae: her traditional dress contrasts with her youngest sister Haruko’s modern dress and earrings, when she’s courted by the younger vineyard owner Kuroki (Tatsuya Nakadai) she talks about the age gap and how things were done in the past. The increasing modernity sees new gadgets such as washing powder, vacuum cleaners and home movies, but for Kazuko in particular the old gender roles still persist. Banking on its enormous star power and a cameo from Ozu regular Chishu Ryu, the movie was the biggest hit for Toho studios at the Box Office, for all its star power some of the plot points are clunky and the lack of an ending leaves a hint of dissatisfaction.





Jiro Sano (Chiezo Kataoka) is a generous, kind-hearted textile factory owner living in the countryside who shows great compassion towards his workers, his dreams of an heir are scuppered by a disfiguring stain on his face, the reason his parents abandoned him as a boy and his marriage proposals are rebuffed. On a trip to Yoshiwara (red-light district in Edo) he becomes smitten with the only geisha not repulsed by his stain Tamatsuru (Yaeko Mizutani). Her story is equally sad: sold into prostitution and labelled by the other geishas as a common criminal unworthy of ever becoming a proper courtesan (tayu). The ruthless environment forces her to train harder and become a courtesan, Jiro wants to marry her and get that heir he craves. His benevolent manner towards his countryside workers is perceived as loose frivolousness by the inn-keeper sensing he can rinse Jiro out of enough money to turn Tamatsuru into a money-making courtesan; when Tamatsuru’s ex-husband tries to get money out of him he’s given harsh treatment and a striking night-time sword fighting scene. Jiro’s clients are worried by his spending habits in Yoshiwara, they don’t want him to have a playboy reputation, a damaging hailstorm and subsequent poor harvest soon turns his fortunes upside down as Tamatsuru’s star rises. The corrosive power of greed and desire for social acceptance are told in vibrant colours accentuating the appeal of Edo in contrast to the more muted textile factory in the countryside, the ending of “Hero of the Red Light District” is as shocking as Tomu Uchida’s earlier directorial effort “Bloody Spear at Mount Fuji”.



“When a Woman Ascends the Stairs” explores the true cost of keeping up appearances in the upmarket Ginza district of Tokyo. Keiko (Hideko Takamine) is a bar hostess affectionately called “Mama” by all her friends and customers, business is falling thanks to a rival bar opened by her former employee Yuri (Keiko Awaji) hoovering up all her old clients, meeting up with Yuri later she learns her old employee’s success is built on mountains of debt. “Mama” switches to a new bar taking all her old staff and customers with her including her understanding manager Komatsu (Tatsuya Nakadai). She and Komatsu go back a long way: he hired her 5 years ago as a cashier and now she’s looking to open her own bar. He’s seen countless women succumb to the pressures of the lifestyle, eventually they all give in to a wealthy patron for that much needed cash, he admires Keiko for keeping her standards up: “if I let my standards drop I’ll give everything up” as Keiko says. Komatsu himself isn’t all that perfect, at the start he talks about “not fiddling with the goods” but he starts seeing his co-worker Junko (Reiko Dan) sheepishly noting “can’t avoid a little smudge with so many women around”. Keiko has three suitors vying to be her patron: an aged executive Mr Minobe (Ganjiro Nakamura), the unattractive factory owner Mr. Sekine (Daisuke Kato) and a married bank manager Mr. Fujisaki (Masayuki Mori), all three are willing to put money forward for her new place but she’s not willing to sell her body: she lost her husband in a car accident and swore never to give herself to another man. Such ideals are the only thing keeping her upright, deep down she hates having to walk upstairs to start her job, wearing expensive kimonos and perfumes to please clients, sending money to help out her family in need, eventually it takes a toll on her health. She looks for security in her loved ones but is frustrated and disappointed every step of the way, but the heroines in Mikio Naruse’s films do not give up so easily.





The opening credits of “Hell” give you a taster of the horrors to come: a cloudy river doubling as Sanzu River, a man falling into a fiery circle, but before we find out what awaits him we return to the real world. Shiro is a promising university student, nice girlfriend Yukiko, the only problem in his life is the scoundrel Tamura. One night Shiro and Tamara run over a drunk yakuza, setting off a chain of events that’ll lead to murders, suicides, drunken parties and shootings. The final 40 minutes of the film are devoted to the brutal tortures of the afterlife: teeth are smashed, bodies sawn in half, impalement, you get the idea. Considered a cult classic in the horror genre, “Hell” was the last film made by Shintoho studios before it declared bankruptcy one year later, the histrionic acting and silly plot twists along with its name have given its detractors ample ammunition over the years.





“Modern Film Association” was formed in 1950 as an independent film studio after directors Kaneto Shindo and Kozaburo Yoshimura left Shochiku, ten years later it was on the verge of bankruptcy, director Kaneto Shindo decided if the studio was going down he wanted to make one artistic film instead of something commercial. Intended as a “cinematic poem” without dialogue, “The Naked Island” was largely filmed on an uninhabited island, focusing on a small family with two young boys struggling for survival. The parents have to carry wooden buckets of water up a steep hill, the bend in the yoke and sweat-drenched faces a far better sign of the tough life than throwaway dialogue, the director’s intention was to "capture the life of human beings struggling like ants against the forces of nature.” A simple tale beautifully told, the strong visuals and haunting score a prime example of how unnecessary dialogue can be. The film won top prize at the Moscow Film Festival, its financial success saved the company which still exists to this day.

The spectre of the nuclear bomb reappeared thanks to the controversial US security treaty in the middle of the Cold War. Toho studios produced two very different films on this topic: the big-budget “The Last War” was the studio’s second highest earner of the year and 9th highest overall. Viewing the escalation of WW III through the eyes of an everyman (Frankie Sakai) and his family, it’s reminiscent of films by Stanley Kramer, the preachy corniness saddled with an overbearing soundtrack is too distracting, the themes too on-the-nose, the english-speaking roles are filled by subpar actors with unconvincing dialogue, the Japanese roles include big name stars Chishu Ryu and So Yamamura as Prime Minister. When miniature models are the only good thing about a movie you know it’s bad.





Anyone expecting swathes of wanton destruction will be disappointed by “Mothra”, a lighter kaiju film with hints of King Kong and shades of Disney. The story begins with four sailors washing up on a remote Pacific island that’s been subjected to nuclear testing, none of them have radiation sickness and one of them mentions natives on the supposedly uninhabitable island. When a joint Japanese-Rolisica expedition to the island discovers two 12-inch tall women (popular singing twins “The Peanuts”) the self-appointed head of the crew Clark Nelson (Japanese-American actor Jerry Ito) sees a business opportunity; when the natives try to stop him stealing the women a second time he guns them down. Disturbing the peaceful islanders brings grave consequences to Japan: Mothra is coming to rescue the two women no matter what. As a Japanese-American co-production bringing english-speaking roles into a Japanese film, part of the story had to be set in an American city, the fictional New Kirk City bearing the brunt of Mothra’s attacks, the fictional country of Rolisica (a mixture of Russia and America) allows its villainous citizen Nelson to get away with all sorts of crimes in Japan. To lighten the story comic actor Frankie Sakai gets plenty of screentime as a tenacious reporter with Kyoko Kagawa co-starring. The special effects and miniatures are a step above “Godzilla”, it’s a colourful trans-Pacific spectacle with an insanely catchy song, the pacing is just too slow to keep it interesting.





The first film made by Nagisa Oshima after leaving Shochiku is “The Catch”, based on a novel by Kenzaburo Oe. A small mountain community in 1945 captures a black American airman, the villagers are split on what to do with him: some are in favour of killing him off, they can’t afford to give away vital food to him, others believe they should keep him prisoner until the authorities make a decision. He’s treated more like an object than a human being, called the ‘n’ word repeatedly, his bear trap is only removed after his wounds begin to rot, pretty soon he gets blamed for every misfortune befalling the village, the corrupt village chief tells them it’s the airman’s fault and he should be killed, the children protest but the adults obey. Another uncompromising look at the darkest aspects of Japanese society during the war (one kid sees Tokyo burning in the distance and celebrates), “The Catch” shows extremists aren’t born overnight and corruption can’t be weeded out in one day.





The Sun-Tribe subculture raised alarm bells for the older generation worried about keeping the youngsters in line. A novel called “Wings that can’t fly” collected the experiences of juvenile delinquents in reform school, the novel became a cinema verite documentary on the reform system and the teenagers navigating it. It’s shot in black and white using non-professional actors, real life locations and improvised dialogue, the main character Asai has been arrested for stealing jewellery, through flashbacks and interviews we discover more about his past, we also see the inner workings of the system and whether it reforms people into good behaviour or reinforces bad. Winner of Best Film by Kinema Junpo magazine and an important social document of its time.


The juveniles being taught a lesson

In response to the increasing gore and violence of samurai flicks, Akira Kurosawa wanted to make a movie showing the damaging effects of violence, he later regretted “Yojimbo” for spawning a new genre of samurai flicks and spaghetti westerns; “A Fistful of Dollars” was an unofficial remake of the Kurosawa film, “Yojimbo” itself is loosely based on 1940s noir flick “The Glass Key”, taken from a Dashiell Hammett novel. The story of a wandering ronin (Toshiro Mifune) playing two sides against one another has become a bit of a cliché, the movie itself still holds up as good entertainment with a surprise turn from Tatsuya Nakadai as a psychotic gunslinger. “Yojimbo” and its sequel “Sanjuro” were massive earners for Toho Studios and Akira Kurosawa.





Ayako is on trial charged with murdering her much older, academic husband Ryokichi on a mountain climbing trip: as the two of them dangled by a rope, Ayako cut the rope leaving her husband to fall to his death. The reporters believe it was murder, convinced by her friendship/romance with a younger man Osamu who was also present on the trip along with a lucrative life insurance policy taken out by Ryokichi. Serving as part courtroom drama and part commentary on freedom in a rigid society, we learn more about the loveless marriage through flashbacks, he’s only interested in drinking and mountain climbing, unwilling to grant her a divorce, she’s a war orphan who struggled to make it into pharmacy school. Osamu used to bring Ayako her medicine and felt sorry for her, the two developed a friendship which Ryokichi called “an affair”, despite Osamu’s engagement to another woman. During the trial the main sticking point is her reasons for cutting the rope: self-preservation or malice? A strong character study and taut thriller.




An absurd farce on sexism in society centres around a TV producer named Kaze, his wife and 9 mistresses, all of them wanting revenge for his philandering and none of them wanting the responsibility of knocking him off. Kaze doesn’t appear to be the suave casanova type with women falling at his feet at the click of his fingers, his job title is alluring enough for some women wishing to climb the greasy pole, Kaze himself is just a nice guy who doesn’t know how he’s managed to snag all these 9 mistresses, or the 30-40 others from work he’s had coffee with. All the women agree if he isn’t stopped he’ll surround himself with a new circle of mistresses, all of them still possess feelings for him but believe he must be killed for his own good. Filmed in noirish black-and-white, it’s a decent farce with some good moments but can’t quite live up to its great premise.


Kaze and his wife + 9 mistresses in the same room

Six years before Seijun Suzuki was fired over his incomprehensibly bizarre film “Branded to Kill”, another young director Masahiro Shinoda made a colourful send-up of the hitman genre. “Killers on Parade” has the standard story of a construction magnate wanting a journalist killed for fear of exposing widespread corruption, a guild of 8 assassins including a doctor (carrying a large bag with the word “doctor” in bold letters for the audience’s sake), a poetic youngster and a woman carrying her baby lamb around hold a contest to decide who gets to kill the journalist, until they’re pipped by an ordinary guy who’s a better shot than all of them. The film isn’t really about the plot, it’s the garish colours, random musical numbers and general absurdity of it all, thanks to the screenplay by avant-garde playwright Shuji Terayama. The movie was a big flop on release, Masahiro Shinoda had to direct more standard fare to get his career back on track, the opening credits give a hint of the impending silliness.





Miho Nishigaki (Hideko Takamine) is pushing 40, lives with her grandmother and runs a Ginza bar. She’s spent all her life working her guts out and has nothing to show for it, the bar belongs to Keijiro (Masayuki Mori), a happily married professor with two kids and wife Ayako (Chikage Awashima). Miho tries a couple things to give her life some kind of meaning, she tries flirting with Minami (Tatsuya Nakadai) and she asks the owners for money to move into a new bar. It turns out Miho has been Keijiro’s mistress ever since the war, even more surprising she’s the real mother of his two children. A story needs a good foundation to help the audience suspend disbelief, “As a Wife, as a Woman” needs additional explaining to successfully change the “non-biological father” trope into a non-biological mother, once the secret is out in the final act it requires a lot of explaining from the main characters, the shaky foundations undercuts the strong acting and the icy scenes between Miho and Ayako. The story focuses on the plight of Miho but in the end the focus switches to the children who prove to be stronger than the adults.


The two children

Teiko gets caught in a whirlwind romance with a businessman called Kenichi ready to move back permanently to Tokyo, they’ve been married a week when he goes on a short business trip to Kanazawa to sort out some things, he doesn’t return. Teiko discovers some postcards hidden in a book and takes the long train journey to the west coast of snow-capped Japan to uncover the truth. Banking on the impossibility of knowing absolutely everything about someone, “Zero Focus” serves up enough plot twists to keep the audience hooked until its overly-talky denouement saps all the mystery and suspense away. Filmed on location in beautiful black and white, a solid mystery film with a beautiful score, Hitchcock fans may be disappointed.






Ageing Tatsuya Nakadai with his son

Shohei Imamura asserts himself as the Anti-Ozu in “Pigs and Battleships”, an exciting mixture of humour, cynicism and despair in the corrupt world of post-war Japan. Kinta (Hiroyuki Nagato) is a small-time hustler and wannabe yakuza, he profits off the nearby American naval base and gets a job taking care of pigs for the local gang. Examining the black market and the pimps, prostitutes and petty criminals making their living from it, its controversial depiction of a U.S military base and perceived anti-American views meant Shohei Imamura was barred from making films for the next two years.





1961 saw the final part of the Human Condition trilogy “A Soldier’s Prayer” released. Kaji (Tatsuya Nakadai) is stuck behind enemy lines, sick of war and fighting with a desire to return home to his wife, but things don’t go according to plan. Adapting a six-volume novel to a 10 hour film trilogy was always going to be a difficult task, especially with the time constraints and usual problems with making a movie. “The Human Condition” has been dubbed one of the greatest film trilogies of all time and one of the greatest anti-war films ever made, I don’t think any film can live up to those expectations but the attention to realism (where applicable!) is certainly impressive, a time when health and safety regulations means certain scenes can’t be filmed with the same sort of realism: in one scene Tatsuya Nakadai spent so much time in the cold he believed he was going to die from hypothermia.