• こころ (Kokoro, 1955 film)

10/18/18 (Thurs)

Ichikawa Kon’s 1955 film, following the broad structure of Natsume Soseki’s iconic novel, is effectively split into two: it begins in Tokyo at the end of the momentous Meiji Era, when a student befriends an older man, then shifts in flashback to the latter’s recollection of his younger years and his confession of a dark secret regarding an old friendship. “Kokoro” means heart or soul, here a deep dark place.

The student Hioki meets the man, known only as Sensei (a term of respect for teachers or older individuals), in unusual circumstances: he saw the man wading into the ocean looking as if he were trying to drown himself and rushed to intervene. Their next meeting is in a cemetery, where the man’s wife Shizu had said he might be. Eventually the student comes to see the man as a mentor and visits his home frequently, which Shizu initially welcomes in hopes of enlivening her grim, solitary husband. But Hioki is bothered by several points: the man is perpetually solemn, visits a certain grave alone every month, does not have intimate relations with his wife (she accuses him of playing around on her, at one point suspecting the student), and carries a dark secret that he promises to tell the student in the future.

He eventually comes clean via a letter to Hioki in a story that dominates the second half of the film, showing Sensei in his student days and his close relation with his old friend Kaji. The latter, despairing of life, has decided to pursue a pure and austere existence, making him increasingly distant from his friend. However, his brooding attempt to pull away from humanity and seek meaning in solitude has only left him dissatisfied. Lured by Sensei into shared lodgings, Kaji finds himself falling much against his will for the landlord’s kind daughter, the young Shizu. Torn between the sensual and his notion of the spiritual, he is reluctant to confess his feelings to her and seeks advice from his friend. Sensei panics, thinking this will take Kaji away from him forever, and maneuvers to get himself engaged to Shizu instead. The shocked Kaji, his love and friendship both betrayed, commits suicide, taking the secret of his love with him. This plunges Sensei into a deep depression that prompts his self-isolation from society in a negative reflection of Kaji’s attempt to do the same through Buddhism, both rejecting the human heart in a misplaced notion of duty and humanity. This naturally affects his marriage – which the wife hints may not even have been consummated – and leads ultimately to tragedy.

Sensei’s relation with Kaji has overt homosexual overtones, though the nature of their friendship is never made clear. His wife accuses him outright of such feelings, but he denies it flatly. The betrayal reminded me of the hip Japanese 1990s gay-themed TV melodrama Dosokai (The Reunion), where the closeted main character, in love with his good friend, stole the latter’s girlfriend in the desperate hope that he could keep the friend nearby. But the gay element in Kokoro, if it exists at all, is less important than the human need for others in all its manifestations. Sensei’s friendship with Kaji parallels his later relation with Hioki, who is seeking a meaningful relationship in his own way.

Matters come to a head for Sensei with the news of Emperor Meiji’s passing after a long and eventful reign. This is a traumatic event for him, as if his past is being torn from him. He is forced further to reflect on his life when General Nogi is revealed to have committed suicide in a traditional notion of honoring the emperor’s death. This leads directly to Sensei’s letter of confession to Hioki and his tragic decision. Hioki, who has gone home to mourn the death of his father, receives the ominous letter from Sensei, his father figure, at the same time. He rushes back to Tokyo too late; I wonder if he’s fated to become the same dour type.

The director does little to lighten the gloom here. Kaji is such a downer throughout the film that it’s never clear why Sensei was so taken with him. Hioki could fairly say the same about Sensei, who he met first when the latter was trying to drown himself and then in a graveyard. I guess we’re supposed to assume that they were all happy with each other at some point, but it would have been helpful if the director had thrown in a few scenes to fill in the blanks.

Still, the film is a skillful mixture of past and present adeptly translated from the novel, which relied on a narrator and gave no names to the characters at all. Ichikawa slowly but steadily rolls out the haunting events that have transformed Sensei’s life and, while the depressing tone is built into the story, offers a credible examination of serious themes. Mori Masayuki is excellent as the troubled Sensei, and Aratama Michiyo expertly handles the complex character of the wife. Not for the faint-hearted, but a worthy adaptation.