Kokosu sezu / 告訴せず / (‘No Charges Filed’, aka ‘Without Complaint’, 1975)

Obscure Japanese Film #172

Kyoko Enami and Yukio Aoshima

 

Kitani (Fumio Watanabe) is a conservative politician running for re-election with the help of his sister-in-law, Haruko (Kirin Kiki), and adviser, Mitsuoka (Ko Nishimura).  When they need someone to go to Tokyo in order to collect 30 million yen in cash for bribery purposes, Kitani’s brother (i.e. Haruko’s husband), seems the perfect choice. He is Shogo (Yukio Aoshima), a schmuck who works as a chef and does whatever his wife tells him. However, he’s also a big fan of crime fiction, and after picking up the cash he immediately absconds with it, hiding out at a hot spring inn where he hooks up with one of the maids, Shino (Kyoko Enami)…

 

Fumio Watanabe

 

Based on an untranslated 1973 novel of the same name by prolific crime writer Seicho Matsumoto, this co-production between Toho and their affiliate, Geiensha, treats the material like a comedy, although it’s seldom very funny. The casting of Yukio Aoshima in the lead and the way he plays the role suggested to me that director Hiromichi Horikawa was looking for a new Keiju Kobayashi, who had starred in many of his earlier films. However, as this film revolves partly around the world of politics and takes a swipe at the way that elections are influenced by money, it’s also possible that Aoshima was cast due to his other career – he had actually entered politics as a Member of the House of Councillors in 1968 and, in 1971, “criticised the large amount of political donations made to the ruling Liberal Democratic Party by the business community” (Japanese Wikipedia). He eventually became Governor of Tokyo from 1995 until 1999, when he lost out to another celebrity politician, Shintaro Ishihara. Like Ishihara, he also dabbled in many different fields, being at various times a screenwriter, lyricist, TV personality, novelist, singer and even film director. His independent 1966 film Kane (The Bell), which he wrote, produced, directed and starred in, screened at Cannes, but sounds like a terribly self-indulgent affair – IMDb offers the following synopsis: “Yukio Aoshima and several of his friends go to the seashore for a weekend, and Yukio films them as they enjoy the sand, the surf, and each other.” (Don’t think I’ll be rushing to seek that one out…) In any case, he’d never been called on to carry a movie before, and on this evidence it’s not hard to see why, as he’s clearly nobody’s idea of a leading man and lacks Keiju Kobayashi’s subtlety and range as well. 

 

The obligatory Eitaro Ozawa appearance

 

One of the more interesting aspects of the film is that it features something called a futomani ritual, which I'd never heard of before. It’s a Shinto method of divination in which the shoulder-blade of a stag is heated over a fire until it cracks, at which point the pattern of the cracks is interpreted for fortune-telling purposes. Incidentally, in the film this is performed by a priest played by Jun Hamamura, who looks almost healthy for once. 

 

Jun Hamamura

 

Overall, though, this film just doesn’t really know what it wants to be. A sequence featuring some weird freeze frames around halfway through does not help and made me think there was a technical fault at first. And if it was supposed to be a comedy – which seems to have been the intention – you have to wonder why on earth they would choose to go with the ending this film is lumbered with. It’s an acceptable time-passer, sure, but on the whole I’d have to call it a misfire. 

 

 

Lake of Tears / 湖の琴 / Umi no koto (1966)

Obscure Japanese Film #14

Katsuo Nakamura and Yoshiko Sakuma

 

Saku (Yoshiko Sakuma) is a teenage girl who comes to work at a silk farm situated between Lake Biwa and its much smaller neighbour, Lake Yogo, the ‘Lake of Tears’ of the English-language title.[1]  This particular silk farm specialises in the making of shamisen strings from silk. The day after her arrival, a young male apprentice named Ukichi (Katsuo Nakamura) arrives and the two soon fall in love. When Ukichi is called up for military service, he stops eating and drinks large quantities of soya sauce in the hope that he will fail the medical and be able to stay with Saku; his scheme fails, but Saku promises to wait for him. In his absence, Monzaemon, a famous shamisen master, pays a visit and takes a shine to her; she is persuaded to leave the silk farm and study the shamisen with him in Kyoto. As the master musician is played by Ganjiro Nakamura – the dirty old man from Odd Obsession and others – it’s no surprise that his interest in Saku is not entirely altruistic, and we’re all set for a tale which seems engineered to fulfil the tragic promise of its title. 

Yoshiko Sakuma and Ganjiro Nakamura

Donald Richie once said that the conflict between giri (obligation) and ninjo (inclination) provides the basis of all Japanese drama. ‘All’ might be going a bit far, but Lake of Tears is certainly a prime example of this – the young couple’s plans are ruined due to Ukichi’s obligation to his country and Saku’s obligation to Monzaemon, which puts her in a very difficult position, especially when she incurs the wrath of his jealous mistress (Michiyo Kogure). 

Ganjiro Nakamura

Set in the mid-1920s, Lake of Tears is one for those with an interest in the traditional side of Japan, and it’s probably this emphasis which led to it being selected as Japan’s submission for Best Foreign Film at the Oscars that year. Considerable attention is given to details of silk production and the string-making process, while there’s much playing of the shamisen when the story moves to Kyoto.

The film was based on a then newly-published novel written by Tsutomu Minakami, whose stories The Temple of the Wild Geese and Bamboo Dolls of Echizen had already been filmed in Japan and would later be translated into English and published by The Dalkey Archive. In the novel, Saku apparently becomes pregnant by Monzaemon, while in the film it’s merely implied that he has forced himself on her, making her final actions rather baffling. The screenplay is by Naoyuki Suzuki, who had also adapted Minakami’s A House in the Quarter for the same director (Tomotaka Tasaka) in 1963, as well as his Straits of Hunger for Tomu Uchida’s excellent film known in the West as A Fugitive from the Past (1965). 

 

Yoshiko Sakuma

 

Yoshiko Sakuma (the female lead in Samurai Banners) is ideal as the unfortunate Saku, while Katsuo Nakamura is decent enough in a rather one-dimensional role, but it’s difficult to understand why he won two Best Supporting Actor awards in Japan for his efforts. He was a brother of Kinnosuke Nakamura and is best known abroad as Hoichi the Earless in Kwaidan. The cast also features Kihachi Okamoto favourite Kunie Tanaka and a young Kirin Kiki as fellow silk spinners. Late in her career, Kikki became a favourite of Hirokazu Koreeda and her talent is already evident here from the way she reacts so well to her fellow actors. 

Katsuo Nakamura and Kirin Kiki

Director Tomotaka Tasaka indulges in some interesting flourishes, at times showing us what his characters are imagining. The most striking example of this is an all-yellow sequence illustrating a fantasy playing out in Monzaemon’s head, while when he improvises a song inspired by Saku, Tasaka cuts to an elaborate montage of flowers and silk-spinning. 

Ganjiro Nakamura and Yoshiko Sakuma

 

I’ve seen two other films by this director (Five Scouts and A Slope in the Sun) and it’s difficult to think of anything they have in common. One interesting fact I managed to uncover is that he was in Hiroshima at the time of the bombing, but was saved from death due to a timely trip to the toilet (although he suffered health issues on and off for the rest of his life as a result of exposure to radiation). Anyway, I would say it is his creativity – along with the excellent colour ‘scope photography of Masahiko Iimura – which makes Lake of Tears worth seeing despite a sentimental, drawn-out and predictable story.

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[1] Confusingly, the Japanese title, Umi no koto, refers to a type of Japanese harp known as a koto.