Beyond Kurosawa

My foray into cinema of a particular language is through an eminent director who made movies in that language. For e.g. Ingmar Bergman led me to Swedish movies, Fellini opened the door of Italian Cinema to me, Truffaut helped me to sail on a French Riviera. Similarly, I took a plunge into Japanese culture by holding the hands of the great cinema maker Akira Kurosawa. Watching a movie of some different foreign language has always given that unique experience and an unexplained thrill.

I have always admired Kurosawa and his ground-breaking work. Probably I will capture Kurosawa’s works in some other blog posts. But this one is about looking beyond Kurosawa in Japanese cinema. And It is specially inspired by two wonderful movies I watched sometime back “Onibaba” directed by Kento Shindo and “Hara-kiri” directed by Masaki Kobayashi.

Harakiri aka Seppuku (1962) was directed by Masaki Kobayashi who was fresh after his monumental movie series The Human condition, and eventually landed into another masterpiece. Harakiri has a very plain simple theme where an old poverty stricken ronin comes to a clan house to commit Harakiri. Harakiri  or better known as seppuku at those times was a way for a Samurai to die gracefully and was an act of redemption. Some more details about this coveted practice are here. 

But what appears a simple desire to commit Harakiri by the old Ronin is not that simple and has some convoluted motives. This movie keeps swinging between the facets of principles, self-respect, humanity and justice.  What astounds me is the way story unfolds layer by layer and the impact created.

Old ronin’s role is marvelously played by the Japanese movie industry’s stalwart “Tatsuya Nakadai”. Nakadai,  who was at that time the most versatile actor and was specially endorsed by Kabayashi. Later he goes on to feature himself in movies of prominent directors like Kurosawa and Hiroshi Teshigahara. In 2015 he was awarded with the “Order of culture”, Japan’s most significant award given to people with significant contribution to art and literature.

The second movie I want to dabble with now is “Onibaba” directed by Kaneto Shindo. This again takes us to Japan’s Medieval age where Samurais, clans, honor and deceit prevail. If you search for this movie, then this movie is enlisted under the horror genre. But just restricting this movie to a single horror genre will be an injustice done to it.

This is a poignant story of two women (daughter in law and her mother in law) who keep killing war racked Samurais and then make money by selling their belongings. They have to resort to this hideous act  just for their survival. The movie then actually changes when their neighbour (who was also fighting along with their son and husband in the fight) comes back and has his own intentions.

Younger of the women is instinctively attracted towards the young man after he makes some invitations to her. This closeness amongst the younger ones creates a sense of insecurity and apathy in the older woman. Her minds keep pondering on how will she survive and on her future.

Onibaba introspects deep into human psychology and their reactions under different situations.  This movie also stands out for the unique ambiance in which it is set in. The swampy vast grasslands consisting of tall intimidating grasses, the never-ending war, human’s effort to survive, all exemplifies this ambiance.  The movie ends with the one of the most psychological and philosophical scene ever created in a movie industry.

Japanese cinema are very easy to watch but they create very deep impact with their simple story-lines. Maybe its same as like other Asian language cinemas like Iranian or Chinese. There is neither the surrealism or neo-realism of European Movies or nor the usual flamboyance of Hollywood movies but they create their own course and are very easy to comprehend. They fully resonate their culture and mannerisms and that what makes them different.

Do witness these movies if you care for serious cinema and want to venture into resplendent Japanese Cinema.