Tag: Toho Company Ltd.

Woman in the Dunes (1964, Teshigahara Hiroshi)

Episodes of the “Twilight Zone” ran thirty minutes, or whatever without commercials, for a very good reason. Stretching a one-note story out to an hour would be too exasperating. Woman in the Dunes stretches it out to, I guess, two and a half hours.

The film starts interestingly enough. An entomologist looking for bugs finds himself in a strange village (where the people live in houses surrounded by sand) and hears about a new species of insect. Having read Abe and seen another film he wrote before, I expected Woman in the Dunes to go somewhere, namely to exploring this strange world. But it doesn’t. It gradually–the scenes are lengthy and padded–becomes clear the film isn’t going anywhere, just like the trapped entomologist and his trapped insects (the symbolism is blatant–actually, it isn’t symbolism… it’s simile). The characters are poorly written. While the man’s captor is just a woman trying to survive, she’s also a raving lunatic, so it isn’t a strike against him when he tries to ransom her for his freedom (if anything, it takes him five or six minutes too long). Except he’s not a good character either, Abe’s fast and loose with him–being an entomologist is his defining trait–and Okada’s either just as lazy (or a rather mediocre actor).

There are some decent shots of sand. Sometimes it falls, sometimes it looks like water running across the surface, but mostly it’s just there. There’s never any point to the shots of the sand. It’s never a symbol of man doing this or that or feeling this or that. It’s all filler and sometimes neat-looking filler. But mostly not.

I can appreciate, like I can appreciate an episode of the “Twilight Zone,” some of the generative reasoning behind the film. I can’t imagine the novel’s similarly paced, since I’ve never heard of its mass burning by attempting readers, but it’s way too long and way too shallow. I guess the director’s cut, which I attempted, runs a half hour longer than the theatrical, which puts a lot of the blame on the, well, the director.

Films appearing to be pretentious and empty are often not difficult to consume–if there were content, even pretentious content, they’d be consumable–they really are just pretentious and empty. And Woman in the Dunes is definitely one of those films. While it’s harmless (except to my time), Abe and, particularly Teshigahara, who fills the film with meaningless shots of sand, knew they were playing to a particular audience and knew they didn’t have to do much work and exploited them.

It’s astounding they not only went on to make an acceptable film, but a decent one (The Face of Another).

0/4ⓏⒺⓇⓄ

CREDITS

Directed and produced by Teshigahara Hiroshi; screenplay by Abe Kôbô, based on his novel; director of photography, Segewa Hiroshi; edited by Shuzui Fusako; music by Takemitsu Toru; production designers, Hirakawa Totetsu and Yamazaki Masao; released by Toho Company Ltd.

Starring Okada Eiji (the entomologist), Kishida Kyoko (the woman) and Ito Hiroko (the entomologist’s wife).

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Kuroneko (1968, Shindô Kaneto)

I thought I was going to start this post with a witty remark regarding the film’s use of repetitiveness to excellent overall effect, but then the movie ended and, by that time, much of the excellence had drained. Kuroneko is a gorgeous film–Shindo uses theatrical lighting effects for ghostly emphasis, which really works–and for a while it seemed like the writing was going to catch up. The film starts incredibly slow and doesn’t encourage much interest for the first forty minutes because of all that repetition. The scenes are different, but the same… They’re meant to show the passage of time in purely expositional narrative. In some ways, it’s a neat trick for adapting a short story (and I’m surprised Kuroneko doesn’t have that base), but it tries the viewer’s patience. Shindo is asking for advance with every repeat and then, at the end, when he comes up short, it hurts the film. It’s amazing too how he’ll come so close and he won’t make it. Instead of giving a solid narrative, he wants a haunting ending to the film. He could have had a haunting ending too… but he ended the film about thirty seconds early. In some cases, it’d be frustrating, but with something like Kuroneko, which constantly takes the “unbelievable character response” fork in the road, I no longer had my hopes up.

The other major issue with Kuroneko, and it’s probably my issue, is the lack of scariness. It’s a horror movie. Regardless of setting, Shindo’s fine composition, camera moves, and lighting techniques, his script follows many horror movie conventions. Lousy unresolved endings being the predominant feature of horror films. I’m just wondering whether or not a Japanese horror film, set in the pre-urban era, is something I could find frightening. It’s not my culture, it’s not a place where the uncanny would make it different because it’s already different. I kept waiting for Kuroneko to work, but I found I couldn’t traverse the historical, foreign barrier into the film. It might not be me, though. When Kuroneko‘s characters are acting ludicrously to milk another fifteen minutes in running time, their being in this samurai era Japan is essential for the viewer to remember, because as people–with real emotions–their actions don’t work. Only if one takes their culture into account, can disbelief at the littlest things be suspended. Unfortunately, a lot of Kuroneko ends up hinging on special effects and makeup. The special effects are good. The makeup’s overboard. It’s literal instead of discreet… even when it’s trying to be discreet.

The performances are fine. Otowa Nobuko is particularly excellent, since her character gets to emote the most. Nakamura Kichiemon is all right–his scenes with Taichi Kiwako are great–but his character flops around is much, it’s not like his performance was going to be anything more. They all manage to keep a straight-face, which is impressive, given just how theatrical some of the lighting gets. It’s usually pushing at the “too much” line.

I guess it’s a disappointment, not because of the long first act (thirty-five minutes of ninety-four), but because of the promising second. I really don’t like being able to chop a film up with acts so easily, but Kuroneko practically has title cards to signal them. Really good sound design. Forgot about the sound design… excellent sound design.

1.5/4★½

CREDITS

Written and directed by Shindo Kanetô; director of photography, Kuroda Kiyomi; edited by Enoki Hisao; music by Hayashi Hikaru; produced by Shinsha Nichiei; released by Toho Company Ltd.

Starring Nakamura Kichiemon (Gintoki), Otowa Nobuko (Yone), Taichi Kiwako (Shige), Sato Kei (Raiko), Tonoyama Taiji (a farmer), Toura Rokko (a samurai) and Kanze Hideo (Mikado).

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Seoul (2002, Nagasawa Masahiko)

An action slash thriller requires a couple things… action set pieces and, well, thrills. Seoul‘s got a couple action set pieces, beginning and end, and not much in the way of thrills. There’s a mystery angle and there are scenes with the cops inspecting crime scenes, but there’s no real investigation at any point. Both the main characters sit and deliberate on the case at hand, but never come to any realization until, obviously, the last possible moment. It’s okay, actually, since Seoul‘s a fish out of water, cop comedy… kind of like a tame Beverly Hills Cop.

Young Japanese cop Nagase Tomoya, who’s all exuberance and little else. I suppose he’s a good shot, as the lack of investigative success certainly doesn’t show any detection prowess. The boss in Korea–so, following the simile, Japan is Detroit and Korea is Beverly Hills–is played by Choi Min-su, who’s the haunted, seasoned cop who’s seen it all. Will the goofy cop make the haunted one laugh again? No. In fact, the film never really gives in on the Choi as a hard-ass front, which was surprising until I realized there wasn’t time for them to do it, since the film’s focus for the first hour is on Nagase hanging out with a Korean noodle-peddler and his nephew. There’s also some hints at investigation and a lot of comedy, but whatever… the most resonant scenes are the noodle-stand scenes, just because Nagase’s a great lead and those scenes give his character a chance to relax and listen and develop.

Seoul‘s a pleasant experience throughout, it just doesn’t have much going in any particular direction. It’s not action-packed, it’s not a straight comedy, it’s not a mystery. I was expecting a romance, but no, not a romance either. It’s a pleasant package. Choi spends most of the film sitting around and looking grim, when it’s apparent he’s a charismatic actor (which he eventually gets to show off, but it takes a long time).

The end gets long fast, as it gets real self-important being about Japanese and Korean foreign relations (in an earlier scene, while Nagase is waxing on about the same thing, the nephew whacks him in the head with a basketball to shut him up), and it seems in danger of losing the comedic aspect. It doesn’t, but it gets it back in frugal way. But still, it’s a pleasant diversion.

1.5/4★½

CREDITS

Directed by Nagasawa Masahiko; written by Hasegawa Yasuo; director of photography, Yamamoto Hideo; edited by Okuhara Yoshiyuki; music by Sumitomo Norihito; produced by Kotaki Shohei, Matsuno Hirofumi and Ogoshi Hirofumi; released by Toho Company Ltd.

Starring Nagase Tomoya (Hayase), Choi Min-su (Kim), Kim Ji-yuon (Yun), Jang Hoon (Min-Cheol), Choi Seong-Min (Kang) and Choi Sung (Lee).

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The Face of Another (1966, Teshigahara Hiroshi)

Novelists make interesting screenwriters (though maybe not as much any more). When they adapt their own work, however, it might not be the best idea. The adaptation allows them to package their interpretation of themselves, as opposed to actually adapting a work from one medium to the next. The Face of Another, adapted by Abe Kôbô from his own novel, is a good example of how not to adapt a novel into a film. Besides including some decidedly bad visuals–not everything can be visualized for film and work in the context of a film, after all–he also made some really bad pacing decisions. The first hour of the film, about a man whose face is horribly scarred in an accident, drags along. It opens well with a scene between the man and his wife and the marriage scenes do play well in the film and should have been it’s secondary focus. However, most of the first hour is spent with the man (who is in bandages for that first hour, until he gets a life-like mask in the second) and his psychiatrist. The psychiatrist somehow becomes the film’s focus, which doesn’t fit….

What does fit the film is the rather novelistic juxtaposition between the man and a pretty young girl with a radiation burn (from Nagasaki) on her face. She appears in the second half and the film switches focus a few times. While he’s desperately trying to fix his psychical appearance amid people who really don’t care (except his wife), she’s kind and good and trying to help people even though child point and scream. In her scenes, there’s a real sense of the post-war condition. His scenes aren’t just missing that setting, they’re missing any subtext. The psychiatrist’s mad dreams of lost identity are a poor substitute for anything going on with the man below the surface. Even the relationship with the wife, which disappears for a good forty minutes only to come back with some promise, fizzles in the end. The end really fizzles as the film gets visually theatrical and Abe keeps novelistic elements film is incapable of presenting.

The acting is excellent, which makes the film’s faults all the more glaring. If this cast couldn’t iron them out, they must be bad. The scarred girl, Irie Miki, never appeared in any other films. The lead, Nakadai Tatsuya, has an impressive emotional range given the first the bandages, then the mask, which stays static, and the character is too shallow. As the film’s configured, the suffering wife (Kyō Machiko) should have been the protagonist, but obviously she isn’t. Only the psychiatrist, Hira Mikijiro, gives a less than stellar performance in one of the main roles, but since his character changes so much from scene to scene, it’s not really his fault.

When I started Face of Another, I was expecting something great, but as it drug on and on–and particularly when it failed to stay on the good course it found in the second hour–I really wondered whether or not a novelist should be adapting his own work. Especially Abe (though I’ve only read one of his novels), who seems to have a good setup then a poor resolution.

2/4★★

CREDITS

Directed and produced by Teshigahara Hiroshi; written by Abe Kôbô, based on his novel; director of photography, Segewa Hiroshi; edited by Shuzui Fusako; music by Takemitsu Toru; production designer, Awazu Kiyoshi; released by Toho Company Ltd.

Starring Nakadai Tatsuya (Okuyama), Hira Mikijiro (Doctor), Kishida Kyoko (Nurse), Kyo Machiko (Mrs. Okuyama), Okada Eiji (Director) and Irie Miki (Girl).

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