Cinema of Japan
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Cinema has a history in Japan that spans more than 100 years.
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Genres
- Anime: Japanese animation.
- Jidaigeki, period pieces featuring samurai, also known as Chambara.
- Kaiju: monster films, such as Godzilla
- Pink films, pornogaphic films. Often more socially-engaged and aesthically well-crafted than simple pornography.
- Yakuza films: films about mobsters.
History
The Silent Era
The first film produced in Japan was the short documentary Geisha No Teodori (芸者の手踊り) in June of 1899.
The first Japanese performer to appear in a film professionally was the dancer/actress Tokuko Nagai Takagi, who appeared in four shorts for the American-based Thanhouser Company between 1911 and 1914 (source) (http://www.brightlightsfilm.com/30/tokuko.html).
Most Japanese cinema theatres at the time employed benshi, narrators whose dramatic readings accompanied the film and its musical score which, like in the West, was often performed live. (See also the books Benshi, Japanese Silent Film Narrators, and their Forgotten Narrative Art of Setsumei A History of Japanese Silent Film Narration by Jeffrey A. Dym and The Benshi--Japanese Silent Film Narrators (http://www.infoasia.co.jp/ucsubs/benshi_e.html).)
The 1923 earthquake, the Allied bombing of Tokyo during World War II, as well as the natural effects of time and Japan's humidity on the then more fragile filmstock have all resulted in a great dearth of surviving films from this period.
Some of the most discussed silent films from Japan are those of Kenji Mizoguchi, whose later works (e.g., The Life of Oharu) are still highly regarded today.
The 1930s
Unlike Hollywood, silent films were still being produced in Japan well into the 1930s. Notable talkies of this period include Mizoguchi's Sisters of the Gion and Osaka Elegy (both 1936). With increasing censorship, the left-leaning tendency films of directors such as Daisuke Ito come under attack.
The 1940s
Akira Kurosawa makes his feature film debut with Sugata Sanshiro in 1943. With the SCAP occupation following the end of WWII, Japan is exposed to over a decade's worth of American animation that had been banned under the war-time government.
The 1950s
The Akira Kurosawa-directed 七人の侍 (The Seven Samurai) is released in 1954, the same year as ゴジラ (Gojira), known to the West (and to Japan from its first sequel on) as Godzilla. Over ten minutes of footage is cut from Godzilla by its American distributor, mostly of wounded civilians in burning cities, evoking the recent Atomic Bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Daikaiju films were a mainstay of Japanese cinema for well into the 1970s, and are still being made today.
Yasujiro Ozu directs Tokyo Story (Tōkyō monogatari) (1953) and Good Morning (Ohayō) (1959).
The 1960s
Technicolor makes its mark. Kon Ichikawa captures the watershed 1964 Olympics in his three-hour documentary Tokyo Olympiad (Tōkyō Orimpikku; 1965). Nikkatsu fires Suzuki Seijun for "making films that don't make any sense and don't make any money" after his surrealist yakuza flick Branded to Kill (1967).
Osamu Tezuka's Tetsuwan Atomu introduces anime to television and gives the world Astro Boy in 1963.
Hiroshi Teshigahara's Woman in the Dunes (1964) takes the Special Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival, and is nominated for Best Director and Best Foreign Language Film Oscars. Masaki Kobayashi's Kwaidan (1965) also picks up the Special Jury Prize at Cannes.
The 1970s
Nagisa Oshima directs Ai no koriida (In the Realm of the Senses; 1976), a World War I period piece about Abe Sada. Staunchly anti-censorship, he insists the film contain hardcore pornographic material; as a result the exposed film must be shipped to France for processing, and an uncut version of the film has still, to this day, never been shown in Japan.
The 1980s
Hayao Miyazaki adapts his manga Nausicaä of the Valley of Wind (Kaze no tani no Naushika) into a feature film (an anime of the same name) in 1984. Katsuhiro Otomo adapts his manga Akira into a feature-length anime in 1988. New anime movies are run every summer and winter with characters from popular TV anime. Shohei Imamura wins the Golden Palm at Cannes for Narayama Bushiko (Ballad of Narayama; 1982).
The 1990s
Shohei Imamura again wins the Golden Palm (shared with Iranian director Abbas Kiarostami), this time for Unagi (The Eel; 1997), joining Alf Sjöberg, Francis Ford Coppola and Bille August as only the fourth two-time recipient. Takeshi Kitano emerges as a significant filmmaker with works such as Sonatine (1993), Kids Return (1996) and Hana-Bi (1997), which was given the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival.
2000 and after
Hayao Miyazaki comes out of retirement to direct Spirited Away (Sen to Chihiro no Kamikakushi; 2001), breaking Japanese box office records and winning the U.S. Academy Award for Best Animated Feature. In 2002, Dolls is released, directed by Takeshi Kitano. The horror films Ringu and Ju-on: The Grudge are remade in English and met with commercial success.
External links
- Japanese Movie Database (in Japanese) (http://www.jmdb.ne.jp/)
- Lisa's Japanese Movie Listing (http://www.lisashea.com/japan/movies/mov_main.html)
- Midnight Eye (http://www.midnighteye.com/)
- Cinemasie (http://www.cinemasie.com/)
- Resources for the study of Japanese Cinema at the University of Iowa Library (http://www.lib.uiowa.edu/eac/japan/RefSourceJpnCinema.htm)
- Colin's Master's of Cinema Page (http://www.quad4x.net/yojinbo/)
- Japanese Cinema to 1960 (http://www.greencine.com/static/primers/japan-60-1.jsp) by Gregg Rickman