- NOH: 歌占、三輪 (Utaura, Miwa)
1/25/25 (Sat), Tokyo
The links between these Konparu shows were the high esteem shown to poetry and the unusual dances incorporated into the works.
Category Archives: Japan
Love Never Dies (Tokyo)
- Love Never Dies (Tokyo)
1/17/25 (Fri), Tokyo
This show, a sequel of sorts to Phantom of the Opera, flopped big time in London and again in a significantly rewritten version in Australia; it never made it to New York. The revised show has had more success in Tokyo, where it has played on several occasions since 2015. The theater in this opening-night performance appeared nearly full. The lead roles are all double- or triple-cast. For the opening, veterans Ichimura Masachiku (now well in his 70s) and Hirahata Ayaka are back as the Phantom and Christine. Interestingly the show is not being produced by Gekidan Shiki, which has made the Japanese Phantom an immense success for the past three decades, but by the smaller Horipro.
The setting is said to be ten years after the original musical (though there’s some confusion in the timeframe). The Phantom, who was left for dead in the original, has somehow survived with the help of Madame Giry and Meg and has moved from the Paris Opera to Coney Island – a good metaphor for the musical’s own journey. Continue reading
A House in the Quarter (五番町夕霧楼)
- 五番町夕霧楼 (A House in the Quarter)
1/14/25 (Tues)
Tasaka Tomotaka’s 1963 version of Minakami Tsutomu’s novel was being shown as part of a celebration of actress Sakuma Yoshiko, whose performance in this weepy transformed her virginal image and propelled her to stardom. It offers a rather sanitized look at a brothel full of happy hookers overseen by a kindhearted madam. While this was hardly Japan’s first work about brothels, its salacious marketing strategy and portrayal of sex, however mild by today’s standards, raised eyebrows at the time and (along with Imamura Shohei’s The Insect Woman) triggered an “erotica boom” in Japan’s film industry.
The Ghost of Yotsuya Parts 1 & 2 (新釈四谷怪談)
- 新釈四谷怪談 Parts 1 & 2 (The Ghost of Yotsuya)
1/11/25 (Thurs)
Kinoshita’s two-part 1949 work is one of more than two dozen film versions of the evergreen Kabuki classic Yotsuya Kaidan since the silent era. The first eight minutes or so of Part 2 simply repeat the final minutes of the first half, so I assume that this was originally intended as a single film, broken up either for excessive length or just to make an extra buck (the second one opened in theaters just two weeks after the first). The original Kabuki version was also split into two days, mixed with scenes from Chushingura (it was a spinoff of the latter), so I suppose it follows tradition in a sense. In any case, the film could and should be reedited into a single 2.5-hour film and should certainly be seen that way.
The Japanese title is literally “Yotsuya Ghost Story: A New Interpretation”. New is right – for one thing, the ghost story has no ghosts. Oiwa appears only as a figment of the guilt-ridden Iemon’s imagination rather than an actual spirit as in the play. The film cleverly has Tanaka Kinuya playing both Oiwa and Oiwa’s sister Osode, so that the latter represents for Iemon a haunting manifestation of Oiwa after her murder.
Shogun vs. Shogun
- Shogun vs. Shogun
1/2/25 (Tues)
I never caught the original Shogun series way back when, so having seen the new version recently, I figured it was time to get caught up. As it turns out, both are superb renditions of the book, but their aims and approaches are very different.
Destiny’s Son (斬る)
- 斬る (Destiny’s Son)
12/27/24 (Fri)
Misumi Kenji’s 1962 chambara flick inconveniently has the same Japanese title Kiru (meaning slash to death) as Okamoto Kihachi’s wild 1968 work, which managed to beat the earlier film to the obvious English choice Kill.
The film opens with a dynamic sequence in which a maidservant sneaks in and stabs the lord’s mistress to death “for the sake of the clan”. Skipping forward a year, we learn that the man chosen to execute her has fallen in love with her, and it is only after their son is born that he duly cuts her head off. He entrusts the child to a low-ranking samurai and becomes a monk, shutting himself off from the world entirely.
Noh: Kagekiyo (景清)
- NOH: 景清 (Kagekiyo)
12/18/24 (Wed)
The great warrior Kagekiyo, devastated after the Heike loss, has blinded himself in despair and lives a desolate life as a recluse in a remote hut in Hyuga Province (today’s Miyazaki Prefecture). His worried daughter, refusing to believe rumors of his death, has set out with her retainer to find him. Continue reading
Madame Butterfly (1915 silent film)
- Madame Butterfly (1915 silent film)
2/1/22 (Tues)
I realized after writing about the Fritz Lang Butterfly that I never posted this review of the older silent version of the opera. I found this film by chance online when doing research for my Kabuki version of Butterfly [which finally debuted in Dec 2024]. The only names I recognized were Mary Pickford in the title role and David Burton as a Japanese prince who wants to marry her – casting that wouldn’t go over well today.
The story is taken broadly from the opera but changed in significant ways. The biggest difference is that Butterfly is not a geisha for hire but the daughter of a well-to-do family, which changes the dynamics considerably. Continue reading
Hero of the Red Light District (妖刀物語：花の吉原百人斬り)
- 妖刀物語：花の吉原百人斬り (Hero of the Red Light District)
12/6/24 (Fri)
Uchida Tomu’s 1960 film draws liberally from the much-revived Meiji-era Kabuki classic Kagotsurube (1888), the story of a lonely pockmarked man whose desperation to be loved makes him an easy mark for unscrupulous people, leading ultimately to tragedy. (The Kabuki was itself based on a real-life incident.) Uchida veers from the popular tale in significant ways that make for an interesting study. A more literal translation of the Japanese title would be something like, “The Story of the Haunted Sword: Glittering Yoshiwara and the Mass Slaying”. (Hyakunin-giri or “mass slaying” literally means slashing 100 persons but is simply meant to indicate a large number of people. The phrase is known for its unfortunate use as a killing contest during Japan’s invasion of China, about which the less said the better. More happily, it can also be a sexual term meaning to bed dozens of people.) The English title is lame: the guy is no hero, and the story involves a street prostitute thrown into the world of courtesans, not quite a red light district.
Fritz Lang’s Harakiri / Madame Butterfly (1918 silent film)
- Fritz Lang’s Harakiri / Madame Butterfly
11/24/24 (Sun)
I was surprised to find a foreign film called Harakiri at all given Kobayashi Masaki’s masterwork by the same English title, but this was in fact a silent German film made in 1918, when Europe was still in the midst of its Japonisme boom. On top of that, it’s based explicitly on Puccini’s Madame Butterfly, which debuted just a few years earlier (the US release used the opera title rather than the more sensational German title). It follows a US silent Butterfly film with Mary Pickford by just three years and is one of the earliest surviving works by the great Fritz Lang. I initially watched a poorly preserved hour-long version online but found a better 90-minute version the next day and re-watched it.
Seisaku’s Wife (清作の妻)
- 清作の妻 (Seisaku’s Wife)
11/2/24 (Fri), Tokyo
This 1965 work was being shown at the Tokyo Film Festival as part of a tribute to director Masumura Yasuzo on the 100th anniversary of his birth. It is the time leading up to the outbreak of war with Russia in 1904. The attractive Okane (Wakao Ayako) has been forced by her desperately poor family to serve for the past three years as mistress to a wealthy but much older man. When he dies and leaves her a small fortune, she returns with her mother to their old village. Unfortunately the villagers, partly jealous of Okane’s newfound wealth, deride her for having sold her body, however unwillingly, and refuse to have anything to do with her. She, in return, makes no attempt to ingratiate herself with them or help with the village work.
Meanwhile, Seisaku (Tamura Takahiro), a local lad, returns from military service in China and is hailed as a hero. Wartime fever has infected the entire village, which sees serving and dying as a glorious act. Seisaku, determined to improve village morale, has forged a large bell that he clangs early each morning to rouse the people to work. They reluctantly do so in deference to him.
Okane, however, ostracized in any case, refuses to play along. This intrigues Seisaku, and slowly but surely they come to fall for each other. Continue reading
Wolves, Pigs and Men (狼と豚と人間)
- 狼と豚と人間 (Wolves, Pigs and Men)
11/1/24 (Fri), Ginza
Fukasaku Kinji’s stellar 1964 work was being shown at the Tokyo Film Festival in a pristine copy in honor of what would have been its star Takakura Ken’s 100th birthday. A violent, relentlessly driving film about three low-life brothers from the slums who become involved on different sides of a dangerous scheme that could be their salvation – or their death warrant. Continue reading
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