Obscure Japanese Film #165
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| Tomohiro Tanabe and Sayuri Yoshinaga |
unning over three hours, this big-budget Toho production spans a period of over 30 years from 1918 to the 1950s, and tells the story of Shinsuke, the son of a Fukuoka coalminer, as he is raised alone by his stepmother (after his father is killed attempting to rescue some trapped Korean miners), survives the Second World War, grows into a man and has his first sexual and romantic experiences.
Tatsuya Nakadai
The first half hour focuses on Shinsuke’s father, Juzo, a tough, brawling miner with a sense of justice, who not only tries to save the exploited Koreans, but had earlier fought against the army as they tried to suppress the workers’ rebellion during the rice riots of 1918. Played in full scenery-chewing mode by Tatsuya Nakadai, he is known as the ‘climbing spider’ and sports a large spider tattoo on his back à la Ayako Wakao in Irezumi (1966). He completely dominates the opening scenes, then departs with a fart gag and is only briefly glimpsed again in a couple of flashbacks.
Once Juzo dies, Shinsuke and his stepmother become the focus. As the character grows from a very young child into a man during the course of the movie, Shinsuke is played by a number of actors, but mainly by Tomohiro Tanabe as a pre-teen and teenager, and by Ken Tanaka as an adult. His stepmother, Tae, is portrayed by Sayuri Yoshinaga, a big star in Japan who has remained little-known abroad but delivers the film’s most convincing performance.
Sayuri Yoshinaga
The beginning of the movie, with its use of speeded-up film and voiceover from a narrator (Shoichi Ozawa) who sometimes even pops up on screen (once during a sex scene, of which there are some weird ones) made me wonder if I was in for some irreverent, Kihachi Okamoto-inspired wackiness, but these eccentric touches ultimately proved too intermittent to seem anything other than occasional bits of whimsy on the part of the director, Kirio Urayama. A former assistant to Shohei Imamura, Urayama had won the Blue Ribbon Award for Best New Director for his debut film, Foundry Town (1962), also starring Sayuri Yoshinaga. Subsequently, he appeared to struggle to find enough work and only managed to complete 10 films before his death at 54 in 1985. Perhaps personal hygiene may have been a reason for his lack of employment, as his Japanese Wikipedia page states:
He hated baths, and when he went to Seijun Suzuki's house while drunk, he was locked naked in the bathroom by Seijun and his common-law wife (whom he later married) because of the terrible smell. However, he managed to escape naked through the bathroom window.
The film proved to be a huge hit at the Japanese box office, leading not only to a sequel two years later, but to a remake (with its own sequel) a mere six years after the original as well as a number of TV adaptations.
Ken Tanaka
Shot in academy ratio, the film looks pretty good, making effective use of real locations and suggesting close attention to historical details in the dressing of the sets, etc. However, I found the character of Shinsuke unsympathetic and many of the performances too broad, while I felt that the writing never rose above the standard of melodrama, the music was uninspired and the whole thing too vulgar and sentimental. In fairness, though, I should point out that a lot of people seem to like this movie and other opinions are available…
Watched with dodgy subtitles.
Thanks to A.K.
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