Devil’s Gold / 魔の黄金 / Ma no ogon (1950)

Obscure Japanese Film #236

Masayuki Mori 

Iwaki (Masayuki Mori) is a gold prospector who has been in the mountains for 13 years – including the entire war – and finally struck it rich. He had originally gone there after being rejected by Tsukie (Chieko Soma), the woman he loved, for not having enough money. Returning to society, he is at first mocked for his uncouth appearance until people realise he’s carrying a fortune, at which point he becomes the toast of the town.

Chieko Soma

Takashi Shimura

Iwaki’s prospecting partner, Akutsu (Takashi Shimura), had died from exposure not long after they struck gold, so he hires Azuma (Eijiro Tono), a drunk who claims to be a detective, to track down Akutsu’s son. Meanwhile, Tsukie turns up, but she’s now married to a sick architect (Jukichi Uno) and is after Iwaki’s money. The only honest person Iwaki encounters is the maid, Tokiko (Michiko Hoshi), at the hotel he stays at, but she’s involved with a poor fisherman, Ichiro (Ichiro Izawa)...

Eijiro Tono

Jukichi Uno

Ichiro Izawa

This Daiei production was based on a novel by the largely forgotten Shu Sekikawa (1912-87) and was the fourth major feature film to be directed by Senkichi Taniguchi. It was also the first of Taniguchi’s features not to have been co-written by Akira Kurosawa, which may be one reason why it’s not as good as the director’s previous three – I doubt that Kurosawa would have been satisfied with the script of this one, which Taniguchi co-wrote with newcomer Takeo Matsuura.

Michiko Hoshi

Taniguchi was an avid mountaineer and, as in his debut feature Snow Trail (1947), there’s some impressive location shooting in the wintry mountains, but the bulk of the story takes place in an urban setting. As a film, it’s not very characteristic of Japan and the influence of Hollywood is obvious throughout. The score by Godzilla composer Akira Ifukube is effective, but unfortunately this is a story which not only unfolds all too predictably, but relies on a couple of annoyingly implausible coincidences.

Mori before and after his trip to the barber

It’s a surprise to see the usually suave Masayuki Mori in such a rough part, but he rather overdoes it and I couldn’t help wonder if Takashi Shimura – wasted here as he all too often was in a small (and in this case poorly-written) role – might have been a better fit. In fact, much of the acting is too broad for my taste, although the women are a notable exception. I personally think they’re usually better actors than the men on the whole, perhaps because they feel less need to show off, and this seems especially true in Japanese films of the post-war period for some reason. As for the two female stars here, Chieko Soma retired from acting at the age of 40 in 1962 and is presumably deceased, whereas Michiko Hoshi was acting as recently as 2013 and appears to be still with us at the time of writing at the ripe old age of 98.

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The Great Journey / 大いなる旅路 / Oinaru tabiji (1960)

Obscure Japanese Film #110

Rentaro Mikuni and Michiko Hoshi

Morioka, Iwate Prefecture, mid-1920s. Kozo Iwami (Rentaro Mikuni) works for the railway as a stoker but wants to become a driver. After failing the exam, he becomes despondent and seeks solace in saké and the arms of bar hostess Koharu (Michiko Hoshi). 

 

Akiko Kazami

One day, Yukiko (Akiko Kazami), a young woman rushing home to see a dying relative, is permitted to ride the freight train on which Kozo is working. This chance meeting leads to marriage, but Iwami fails to change his ways and continues seeing Koharu, hardly even bothering to hide the fact from his wife. However, when an avalanche causes Kozo’s train to derail and the driver is killed, Kozo undergoes a personality change. 

Mikuni

 

It’s not entirely clear why this occurs, but perhaps it’s just due to the fact that he now realises how lucky he is to be alive. In any case, he stops seeing Koharu and begins taking his job more seriously, eventually becoming a driver as a result. 

 

Ken Takakura

The years pass, and Kozo and Yukiko have four children: Tadao (Hiroshi Minami), who gets called up for military service in China and is soon killed; Shizuo (Ken Takakura), who follows in his father’s footsteps and joins the railway; Sakiko (Mitsue Komiya), who marries the wrong type of guy; and Takao (Katsuo Nakamura), who voluntarily enlists in the army but later returns embittered and in poor health. 

Katsuo Nakamura

 

Mikuni

 

Spanning three decades, this features Mikuni in another role in which he has to age considerably over the course of the movie, as he had previously done in Stepbrothers (1957) and Ballad of a Cart-Puller (1959). However, this was the first time he had won an award for such an effort, namely the Blue Ribbon for Best Actor. Kozo is a complex character and our feelings about him change as the story progresses; at first, seeing him as an uncouth worker in a wintry location who gets passed over for promotion, I thought he was going to be another Gonsuke from A Story from Echigo. However, though he can be unforgiving and even violent at times, Kozo usually regrets his actions almost immediately and sometimes displays a generosity of spirit. Mikuni made another railway picture, Oinaru bakushin, for the same director, Hideo Sekigawa, later the same year, but he played a different character and the stories were not connected, although both screenplays were written by – you guessed it (or not) – that one-man screenplay-machine, Kaneto Shindo. While many of Sekigawa’s films appear to have been routine assignments, he directed a couple of notable anti-war films: Listen to the Voices of the Sea (1950) and Hiroshima (1953), and he does a good job here, with the location shooting being particularly impressive, although the story has not dated well and must have seemed old-fashioned even at the time. 

Takakura and Mikuni

 

The first half hour of the film is the most interesting – once Kozo changes his attitude after the accident, it becomes a sentimental family saga which unfolds all too predictably, while Ichiro Saito’s music lays on the harps and strings a bit thick. Like the previous film I reviewed, this is another with a strongly conservative message: everyone learns the error of their ways, and hard work and dedication to duty are rewarded in the end. This ideology is especially surprising coming from a couple of leftists like Sekigawa and Shindo.

Michiko Hoshi

 

Perhaps the most impressive thing about the film is the fact that they actually wrecked a real train in order to make it, a feat made possible due to Toei president Hiroshi Okawa, a former railroad employee who had maintained good connections with Japan’s national railway. 

The omnipresent Eijiro Tono

 

Note on the title: The film is sometimes referred to as 'The Great Road', which makes little sense as tabiji means 'journey' rather than 'road'. It's also clear from the film that 'journey' has the double meaning of a railway journey and the journey of life.

The Flute-Playing Warrior / 笛吹若武者 / Fuefuki wakamusha (1955)

Obscure Japanese Film #98

Hibari Misora

This Toei production set in the Heian period stars singing sensation Hibari (‘Skylark’) Misora as Princess Tamaori, a young noblewoman who travels to Kyoto with her mother, Lady Tsubaki (Chiaki Tsukioka), to meet her estranged father, Lord Tsunemori (Makoto Usami), for the first time. On the way, she stops to sing a song and attracts the attention of Prince Atsumori (Hashizo Okawa), a music-loving member of the Heike clan who whips out his flute and joins her in a duet. It’s a case of love at first sight, but when she reaches Kyoto, she’s shocked to learn that Atsumori is her half-brother by a different mother. 

 

Chiaki Tsukioka

Meanwhile, her mother is having an affair with Lord Tokitada (Masao Hori), a wily schemer who has a plan to gain power and influence by arranging a marriage between Tamaori and Konoe Motomichi (Akashi Ushio), the chief advisor to the Emperor. Atsumori has his own troubles, too – he's being pursued by Princess Katsura (Michiko Hoshi), who is determined to marry him and won’t take no for an answer. As these personal affairs become increasingly problematic, war breaks out between the Heike clan and their rivals, the Genji clan…

 

Hashizo Okawa

Although technically this could be labelled a musical, there are no big Hollywood-style production numbers, just occasional pauses for Hibari to sing part of a song. Like her counterpart Chiemi Eri (born the same year), Hibari also had some acting ability, and she’s especially convincing in a scene towards the end in which she suffers an emotional breakdown. For the rest of the picture, she seems more subdued than usual, perhaps because she’s playing quite an unhappy character. On the other hand, maybe she was just knackered as she was starring in ten films a year at this point. In any case, it’s Michiko Hoshi who steals the film here as her tactless, insinuating, bitchy rival. She comes as something of a breath of fresh air in contrast to the other characters, who are mostly solemn and rather dull, especially the flute-playing warrior himself. At the time of writing, Michiko Hoshi is still with us at the age of 97.

 

Michiko Hoshi

The literary source is a play by Hideji Hojo (1902-96), who based many of his works on The Tale of Genji, which seems also to have been the case here. The director, Yasushi Sasaki (1908-93), was a veteran who specialised in period films and directed around 20 Hibari vehicles. With a reputation for working quickly and making commercially successful movies, he was highly valued by the studios he worked for, but made little dent on film history. Nevertheless, The Flute-Playing Warrior remains an enjoyable piece of entertainment from a bygone era.

 

Tarao Bannai - Thirteen Demon Lords / 多羅尾伴内 十三の魔王 / Tarao Bannai – Juzo no mao (aka The Man with Thirteen Eyes, 1958)

Obscure Japanese Film #96

Chiezo Kataoka as Tarao Bannai

When a nightclub singer is killed under mysterious circumstances at a racetrack, master detective Tarao Bannai (Chiezo Kataoka) adopts a number of disguises in an attempt to unmask the killer. The suspects include Dr Izumaru (Eitaro Shindo), his wife (Mieko Takamine), his assistant (Michiko Hoshi), the dead girl’s ex-lover (Ken Takakura), crooked businessman Togame (Takashi Shimura) a nightclub owner (Masao Mishima), and a nightclub hostess (Mitsuko Miura). 

Michiko Hoshi

 

Eitaro Shindo

Masao Mishima

Mitsuko Miura

The character of Tarao Bannai was created for the movies in 1946 by screenwriter Yoshitake Hisa (1904-81) in order to provide a new vehicle for veteran star Chiezo Kataoka. After the war, the occupying Americans had banned sword-fighting films in the belief that they encouraged feudalism, leaving Kataoka unable to perform the type of roles for which he was famous. Fortunately for Kataoka, the first film was a hit with the public if not with the critics.  He starred in four Tarao Bannai pictures for Daiei in the late ‘40s; when he later fell out with the studio, he made a further seven films featuring the character for Toei between 1953 and 1960. Thirteen Demon Lords was the first of these to be shot in colour and widescreen, and perhaps for that reason it boasts a remarkably strong cast including a young Ken Takakura, veteran star and respected actress Mieko Takamine, and Kurosawa favourite Takashi Shimura. However, despite such stiff competition, this is Kataoka’s show all the way. 

Ken Takakura

 

Mieko Takamine

Takashi Shimura

 

Outside of Japan, Chiezo Kataoka is perhaps best-known for his leading roles in a number of Tomu Uchida films, the most widely-seen of which is probably Bloody Spear at Mount Fuji, though he also played the nihilistic samurai Ryunosuke Tsukue in Uchida’s three-film version of the novel Daibosatsu Toge – a character later immortalised by Tatsuya Nakadai in Sword of Doom. He was a wonderfully versatile actor as we can see from his performance (or performances) in Thirteen Demon Lords. Although the disguises that his character adopts (an Indian magician, a beatnik artist, etc) are often utterly ridiculous, the extent to which Kataoka not only changes his appearance, but subtly alters his voice and body language each time is impressive. If it’s not too confusing, it should perhaps be noted that the character of Tarao Bannai himself is actually another alter-ego – the ‘real’ person behind the different faces is one Daizo Fujimura, a former jewel thief who has turned his back on his criminal past to become a crusader for justice. 

Chiezo Kataoka

 

Chiezo Kataoka

Kataoka as Daizo Fujimura

With its unlikely nick-of-time escapes and evil criminal mastermind who relishes the use of poison gas and dripping acid, this recalls the serials of the 1920s and ‘30s and is, of course, pure hokum, but it’s also pretty good fun if you’re in the mood. However, I’m not sure I’d want to sit through the other ten movies in the series as they apparently followed a pretty rigid formula, with Bannai adopting the same number of disguises each time (always seven) and departing in the same manner at the end of each film, although this very repetition seems to have become an element that the Japanese audiences of the time enjoyed.

Director Sadatsugu Matsuda (1906-2003) directed most of the entries in the series and divided his time between this sort of film and chanbara flicks. The character was briefly revived for two films in 1978 starring Akira Kobayashi, but did not catch on.

Watched with dodgy subtitles. 

Joshu karasu / 上州鴉 ('Crow of Joshu', 1951)

Obscure Japanese Film #95

Denjiro Okochi

 

This Daiei production stars silent screen veteran Denjiro Okochi as Takizo, a wandering samurai and master swordsman who returns incognito to the town where he was born, hoping to shake off some men pursuing him. Once there, he meets Sahei (Koichi Katsuragi), a widowed farmer, to whom he will later confess that his mother (now deceased) was a maid who became pregnant by a criminal and had to give birth to him in a warehouse. 

Michiko Hoshi

 

Sahei has two daughters, Okimi (Michiko Hoshi) and Omitsu (Kazuko Takamori). Unable to pay the annual tax, Sahei asks government official Yamagataya (Ryanosuke Higashi) to take Omitsu in as an indentured servant instead. Yamagataya agrees, but secretly intends to pimp her out.

 

Kotaro Bando

 

Mitsusaburo Ramon

Meanwhile, Inoyuki (Kotaro Bando) visits a gambling den owned by Hikigoro (Mitsusaburo Ramon from The Mysterious Edogawa Ranzan) in an attempt to raise money so that his sick wife Okichi (Mitsuko Mito) can take a rest, but he loses and is tricked into signing Okichi over to Hikigoro. Observing the way the innocent townspeople are abused and cheated by the powerful and corrupt, Takizo decides that it’s time to for him to come out of hiding and intervene…

Mitsuko Mito

 

Based on an original work by Shintaro Mimura, the screenplay was written by Kaneto Shindo, who must not only have been the most prolific screenwriter of all time, but who also maintained an impressively high standard throughout his 70-year career. Director Taizo Fuyushima (1901-81) was new to me, but on this evidence he seems worthy of further investigation as Joshu karasu features excellent mobile camerawork courtesy of Yasukazu Takemura, some very well-co-ordinated and complex staging, a lively sense of rhythm in the editing and a strong ensemble cast, including that reliable old scene-stealer Daisuke Kato as a travelling con artist. 

Daisuke Kato

 

Atsushi Watanabe and Toshiaki Konoe

Atsushi Watanabe and Toshiaki Konoe are also great fun as a couple of oddball palanquin carriers, one of whom has a topknot with a life of its own. The fight scenes are well above-average for 1951, too – one even takes place in heavy rain, which would soon become a Kurosawa trademark (not the only time this film brought Kurosawa to mind). 

Denjiro Okochi

 

It’s a marvel how the Japanese cinema of this period appears to have been populated with an almost endless number of excellent directors of whom we’ve never heard. Taizo Fuyushima’s career stretched back to 1926 and he directed over 90 films, mainly period dramas, but he seems to be almost completely forgotten. After his retirement, he made kabuki paper dolls, at which he was considered a master, and took on a number of pupils.

Denjiro Okochi and Koichi Katsuragi

 

Watch on my YouTube channel (no subtitles)

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