Kenji Mizoguchi
Template:Short description Template:Infobox person
Template:Nihongo was a Japanese filmmaker who directed roughly one hundred films during his career between 1923 and 1956.<ref name="jmdb">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref name="kinenote">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref name="kotobank">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> His most acclaimed works include The Story of the Last Chrysanthemums (1939), The Life of Oharu (1952), Ugetsu (1953), and Sansho the Bailiff (1954),<ref name="Harvard">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref name="soc">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> with the latter three all being awarded at the Venice International Film Festival. A recurring theme of his films was the oppression of women in historical and contemporary Japan.<ref name="kinenote" /><ref name="kotobank" /><ref name="Jacoby">Template:Cite book</ref> Together with Akira Kurosawa and Yasujirō Ozu, Mizoguchi is seen as a representative of the "golden age" of Japanese cinema.<ref name="Sharp">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>
BiographyEdit
Early yearsEdit
Mizoguchi was born in Hongō, Tokyo, as the second of three children, to Zentaro Miguchi, a roofing carpenter, and his wife Masa.<ref name="Le Fanu">Template:Cite book</ref><ref name="dudley">Template:Cite book</ref><ref name="sato">Template:Cite book</ref> The family's background was relatively humble until the father's failed business venture of selling raincoats to the Japanese troops during the Russo-Japanese War.<ref name="Le Fanu" /><ref name="dudley" /><ref name="sato" /> The family was forced to move to the downtown district of Asakusa and gave Mizoguchi's older sister Suzu up for adoption, which in effect meant selling her into the geisha profession.<ref name="Le Fanu" /><ref name="dudley" /><ref name="sato" />
In 1911, Mizoguchi's parents, too poor to continue paying for their son's primary school training, sent him to stay with an uncle in Morioka in northern Japan for a year,<ref name="Le Fanu" /><ref name="dudley" /> where he finished primary school.<ref name="dudley" /> His return coincided with an onset of crippling rheumatoid arthritis,<ref name="dudley" /> which left him with a walking gait for the rest of his life.<ref name="Le Fanu" /> In 1913, his sister Suzu secured him an apprenticeship as a designer for a yukata manufacturer, and in 1915, after the mother's death, she brought both her younger brothers into her own house.<ref name="Le Fanu" /><ref name="dudley" /> Mizoguchi enrolled for a course at the Aoibashi Yoga Kenkyuko art school in Tokyo, which taught Western painting techniques,<ref name="Le Fanu" /><ref name="dudley" /> and developed an interest in opera, particularly at the Royal Theatre at Akasaka where he helped the set decorators with set design and construction.<ref name="Le Fanu" /><ref name="sato" />
In 1917, his sister again helped him to find work, this time as an advertisement designer with the Yuishin Nippon newspaper in Kobe.<ref name="Le Fanu" /><ref name="dudley" /><ref name="sato" /> The film critic Tadao Sato has pointed out a coincidence between Mizoguchi's life in his early years and the plots of Template:Transliteration dramas, which characteristically documented the sacrifices made by geisha on behalf of the young men they were involved with. Probably because of his familial circumstances, "the subject of women's suffering is fundamental in all his work; while sacrifice – in particular, the sacrifice a sister makes for a brother – makes a key showing in a number of his films, including some of the greatest ones (Sansho the Bailiff/Sansho Dayu [1954], for example)."<ref name="Le Fanu" /> After less than a year in Kobe, however, Mizoguchi returned "to the bohemian delights of Tokyo" (Mark Le Fanu).<ref name="Le Fanu" /> In 1920, Mizoguchi entered the film industry as an assistant director at the Nikkatsu studios in Mukojima, Tokyo.<ref name="kinenote" /><ref name="kotobank" /> Three years later, he gave his directorial debut with Ai ni yomigaeru hi (The Resurrection of Love).<ref name="kinenote" /><ref name="kotobank" />
Film careerEdit
After the 1923 earthquake in Tokyo, Mizoguchi moved to Nikkatsu's studios in Kyoto. His early works included remakes of German Expressionist cinema<ref name="kinenote" /><ref name="kotobank" /> and adaptations of Eugene O'Neill and Leo Tolstoy.<ref name="Le Fanu" /> While working in Kyoto, he studied kabuki and noh theatre, and traditional Japanese dance and music.<ref name="sato" /> He was also a frequent visitor of the tea houses, dance halls and brothels in Kyoto and Osaka,<ref name="Le Fanu" /> which at one time resulted in a widely covered incident of him being attacked by a jealous prostitute and then-lover with a razor.<ref name="Le Fanu" /><ref name="dudley" /><ref name="contexts">Template:Cite book</ref> His 1926 Passion of a Woman Teacher (Kyōren no onna shishō) was one of a handful of Japanese films shown in France and Germany at the time and received considerate praise,<ref name="soc" /> but is nowadays lost like most of his 1920s and early 1930s films.<ref name="Jacoby" /> By the end of the decade, Mizoguchi directed a series of left-leaning "tendency films", including Tokyo March and Metropolitan Symphony (Tokai kokyōkyoku).<ref name="kinenote" /><ref name="kotobank" /><ref name="Le Fanu" />
In 1932, Mizoguchi left Nikkatsu and worked for a variety of studios and production companies.<ref name="Le Fanu" /> The Water Magician (1933) and Orizuru Osen (1935) were melodramas based on stories by Kyōka Izumi, depicting women who sacrifice themselves to secure a poor young man's education. Both have been cited as early examples of his recurring theme of female concerns and "one-scene-one-shot" camera technique,<ref name="kinenote" /><ref name="Jacoby" /> which would become his trademark.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> The 1936 diptych of Osaka Elegy and Sisters of the Gion, about modern young women (moga) rebelling against their surroundings, is considered to be his early masterpiece.<ref name="kinenote_osaka">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref name="kotobank_Osaka">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref name="Anderson-Richie">Template:Cite book</ref> Mizoguchi himself named these two films as the works with which he achieved artistic maturity.<ref name="bfi">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Osaka Elegy was also his first full sound film,<ref name="filmcomment">Template:Cite magazine</ref> and marked the beginning of his long collaboration with screenwriter Yoshikata Yoda.<ref name="kinenote_osaka" /><ref name="timeout">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>
1939, the year when Mizoguchi became president of the Directors Guild of Japan,<ref name="Le Fanu" /> saw the release of The Story of the Last Chrysanthemums, which is regarded by many critics as his major pre-war,<ref name="bfi" /> if not his best work.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Here, a young woman supports her partner's struggle to achieve artistic maturity as a kabuki actor at the price of her health.
During World War II, Mizoguchi made a series of films whose patriotic nature seemed to support the war effort. The most famous of these is a retelling of the classic samurai tale The 47 Ronin (1941–42), an epic jidaigeki (historical drama). While some historians see these as works which he had been pressured into,<ref name="Dougill">Template:Cite book</ref> others believe him to have acted voluntarily.<ref name="Burch">Template:Cite book</ref> Fellow screenwriter Matsutarō Kawaguchi went as far as, in a 1964 interview for {{#invoke:Lang|lang}}, calling Mizoguchi (whom he otherwise held in high regard) an "opportunist" in his art who followed the currents of the time, veering from the left to the right to finally become a democrat.<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref>
1941 also saw the permanent hospitalisation of his wife Chieko (m. 1927),<ref name="Le Fanu" /> whom he erroneously believed to have contracted venereal disease.<ref name="Shindo-DVD">Template:Cite AV media</ref>
International recognitionEdit
During the early post-war years following the country's defeat, Mizoguchi directed a series of films concerned with the oppression of women and female emancipation both in historical (mostly the Meiji era) and contemporary settings. All of these were written or co-written by Yoda, and often starred Kinuyo Tanaka, who remained his regular leading actress until 1954, when both fell out with each other over Mizoguchi's attempt to prevent her from directing her first own film.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref name="Irene">Template:Cite book</ref> Utamaro and His Five Women (1946) was a notable exception of an Edo era jidaigeki film made during the Occupation, as this genre was seen as being inherently nationalistic or militaristic by the Allied censors.<ref name="bfi" /><ref name="Freiberg">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Of his works of this period, Flame of My Love (1949) has repeatedly been pointed out for its unflinching presentation of its subject.<ref name="Jacoby" /><ref name="mylove">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Tanaka plays a young teacher who leaves her traditionalist milieu to strive for her goal of female liberation, only to find out that her allegedly progressive partner still nourishes the accustomed attitude of male preeminence.
Mizoguchi returned to feudal era settings with The Life of Oharu (1952), Ugetsu (1953) and Sansho the Bailiff (1954), which won him international recognition, in particular by the Cahiers du Cinéma critics such as Jean-Luc Godard,<ref name="kinenote" /> Eric Rohmer<ref name="soc" /> and Jacques Rivette,<ref name="rivette">Template:Cite magazine</ref> and were awarded at the Venice Film Festival.<ref name="kinenote" /><ref name="kotobank" /> While The Life of Oharu follows the social decline of a woman banished from the Imperial court during the Edo era, Ugetsu and Sansho the Bailiff examine the brutal effects of war and reigns of violence on small communities and families. In between these three films, he directed A Geisha (1953) about the pressures put upon women working in Kyoto's post-war pleasure district. After two historical films shot in colour (Tales of the Taira Clan and Princess Yang Kwei Fei, both 1955),<ref name="Sharp2">Template:Cite book</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Mizoguchi once more explored a contemporary milieu (a brothel in the Yoshiwara district) in black-and-white format with his last film, the 1956 Street of Shame.
Mizoguchi died of leukemia at the age of 58<ref name="dudley" /><ref name="Sharp2" /><ref>Template:Cite news</ref> in the Kyoto Municipal Hospital.<ref name="Shindo-DVD" /> At the time of his death, Mizoguchi was working on the script of An Osaka Story, which was later realised by Kōzaburō Yoshimura.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>
International appreciationEdit
‘On 24 August 1956, Japan's greatest film-maker died in Kyoto. And one of the greatest filmmakers of all time. Kenji Mizoguchi was the equal of a Murnau or a Rossellini... If poetry appears at every second, in every shot that Mizoguchi makes, it is because, as with Murnau, it is the instinctive reflection of the inventive nobility of its author’. Jean-Luc Godard, Arts, 5 February 1958.<ref>https://www.mcjp.fr/fr/kenji-mizoguchi</ref><ref>https://www.cinematheque.fr/media/mizoguchi.pdf</ref>
‘There is no doubt that Kenji Mizoguchi, who died three years ago, was his country's greatest filmmaker. He knew how to discipline for his own use an art born in other climes and from which his compatriots had not always made the most of. And yet there is no slavish desire on his part to copy the West. His conception of setting, acting, rhythm, composition, time and space is entirely national. But he touches us in the same way as Murnau, Ophüls or Rossellini’. Éric Rohmer, Arts, 25 September 1959.<ref>https://www.cinelounge.org/Perso/94/Kenji-Mizoguchi</ref>
‘Comparisons are as inevitable as they are unfashionable: Mizoguchi is the Shakespeare of cinema, its Bach or Beethoven, its Rembrandt, Titian or Picasso’, James Quandt, Mizoguchi the Master, (retrospective of Mizoguchi centenary films), Cinematheque Ontario and The Japan Foundation, 1996.<ref>https://epe.lac-bac.gc.ca/100/202/300/offscreen/2010/v14n01/www.offscreen.com/index.php/lib/cat/asian/P60/default.htm</ref><ref>https://offscreen.com/view/mizoguchi</ref>
FilmographyEdit
Silent filmsEdit
| Year | English title | Japanese title | Romanized title | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1923 | The Resurrection of Love | Ai ni yomigaeru hi | Lost film | |
| Hometown | Kokyō | Lost film | ||
| Dreams of Youth | Seishun no yumeji | Lost film | ||
| City of Desire | Joen no chimata | Lost film | ||
| Song of Failure | Haisan no uta wa kanashi | Lost film | ||
| 813: The Adventures of Arsène Lupin | 813 | Lost film | ||
| Foggy Harbour | Kiri no minato | Lost film | ||
| The Night | Yoru | Lost film | ||
| In the Ruins | Haikyo no naka | Lost film | ||
| Blood and Soul | Chi to rei | Lost film | ||
| Song of the Mountain Pass | Tōge no uta | Lost film | ||
| 1924 | The Sad Idiot | Kanashiki hakuchi | Lost film | |
| Death at Dawn | Aka tsuki no shi | Lost film | ||
| Queen of Modern Times | Gendai no joō | Lost film | ||
| Strong is the Female | Jose wa tsuyoshi | Lost film | ||
| This Dusty World | Jinkyō | Lost film | ||
| Turkeys in a Row | Shichimenchō no yukue | Lost film | ||
| The Death of a Police Officer | Itō junsa no shi | Co-direction, lost film | ||
| Chronicle of the May Rain | Samidare zōshi | Lost film | ||
| Love-Breaking Axe | Koi o tatsu ono | Co-direction, lost film | ||
| Kanraku no onna | A Woman of Pleasure | Lost film | ||
| Queen of the Circus | Kyokubadan no Jo | Lost film | ||
| 1925 | Ah, Special Battleship Kanto | Ā tokumukan Kanto | Co-direction, lost film | |
| Uchien Puchan | Uchien Puchan | Lost film | ||
| Out of College | Gakusō o idete | Lost film | ||
| The Earth Smiles: Part 1 | Daichi wa hohoemu: Daiichibu | Lost film | ||
| The White Lily Laments | Shirayuki wa nageku | Lost film | ||
| Shining in the Red Sunset | Akai yūki ni terasarete | Lost film | ||
| The Song of Home | Furusato no uta | Earliest extant film | ||
| Street Sketches | Shōhin eigashū: Machi no suketchi | Co-direction, lost film | ||
| Human Being | Ningen | Lost film | ||
| General Nogi and Kuma-San | Nogi Taisho to Kuma-San | Lost film | ||
| 1926 | The Copper Coin King | Dōkaō | Lost film | |
| A Paper Doll's Whisper of Spring | Kaminingyō haru no sasayaki | Lost film | ||
| My Faultn New Version | Shinsetsu ono ga tsumi | Lost film | ||
| Passion of a Woman Teacher | Kyōren no onna shishō | Lost film | ||
| The Boy of the Sea | Kaikoku danji | Lost film | ||
| Money | Kane | Lost film | ||
| 1927 | The Imperial Grace | Kōon | Lost film | |
| The Cuckoo | Jihishinchō | Lost film | ||
| 1928 | A Man's Life: Money is Everything in Life | Hito no isshō: Jinsei banji kane no maki | Lost film | |
| A Man's Life: This Floating World is Hard | Hito no isshō: Ukiyo wa tsurai ne no maki | Lost film | ||
| A Man's Life: Bear and Tiger Meet Again | Hito no isshō: Kuma to tora saikai no maki | Lost film | ||
| My Lovely Daughter | Musume kawaiya | Lost film | ||
| 1929 | Bridge of Japan | Nihonbashi | Lost film | |
| The Morning Sun Shines | Template:Nihongo2 | Asahi wa kagayaku | Co-direction, few minutes preserved | |
| Tokyo March | Template:Nihongo2 | Tōkyō kōshinkyoku | Few minutes preserved | |
| Metropolitan Symphony | Tokai kokyōkyoku | Lost film | ||
| 1930 | Hometown | Fujiwara Yoshie no furusato | ||
| Okichi, Mistress of a Foreigner | Template:Nihongo2 | Tōjin Okichi | Few minutes preserved | |
| 1931 | And Yet They Go On | Shikamo karera wa yuku | Lost film | |
| 1932 | The Man of the Moment | Toki no ujigami | Lost film | |
| The Dawn of Manchuria and Mongolia | Manmō kenkoku no reimei | Lost film | ||
| 1933 | The Water Magician | Template:Nihongo2 | Taki no shiraito | |
| Gion Festival | Gion matsuri | Lost film | ||
| 1934 | The Jinpu Group | Jimpūren | Lost film | |
| The Mountain Pass of Love and Hate | Template:Nihongo2 | Aizō tōge | Lost film | |
| 1935 | The Downfall of Osen | Template:Nihongo2 | Orizuru Osen |
Sound filmsEdit
| Year | English title | Japanese title | Romanized title | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1935 | Oyuki the Virgin | Template:Nihongo2 | Mariya no Oyuki | |
| The Poppy | Gubijinsō | |||
| 1936 | Osaka Elegy | Template:Nihongo2 | Naniwa erejī | |
| Sisters of the Gion | Template:Nihongo2 | Gion no kyōdai | ||
| 1937 | The Straits of Love and Hate | Template:Nihongo2 | Aien kyō | |
| 1938 | Song of the Camp | Roei no uta | ||
| 1939 | The Story of the Last Chrysanthemums | Template:Nihongo2 | Zangiku monogatari | |
| 1939 | A Woman of Osaka | Naniwa onna | Lost film | |
| 1941 | The Life of an Actor | Geidō Ichidai Otoko | ||
| The 47 Ronin Part 1 | Template:Nihongo2 | Genroku chūshingura | ||
| 1942 | The 47 Ronin Part 2 | |||
| 1944 | Three Generations of Danjuro | Danjurō sandai | ||
| Miyamoto Musashi | Template:Nihongo2 | Miyamoto Musashi | ||
| 1945 | The Famous Sword | Template:Nihongo2 | Meitō Bijomaru | |
| Victory Song | Hisshōka | Co-direction with Masahiro Makino and Hiroshi Shimizu | ||
| 1946 | Victory of Women | Template:Nihongo2 | Josei no shōri | |
| Utamaro and His Five Women | Template:Nihongo2 | Utamaro o meguru gonin no onna | ||
| 1947 | The Love of Sumako the Actress | Template:Nihongo2 | Joyū Sumako no koi | |
| 1948 | Women of the Night | Template:Nihongo2 | Yoru no onnatachi | |
| 1949 | Flame of My Love | Template:Nihongo2 | Waga koi wa moenu | |
| 1950 | Portrait of Madame Yuki | Template:Nihongo2 | Yuki fujin ezu | |
| 1951 | Miss Oyu | Template:Nihongo2 | Oyū-sama | |
| The Lady of Musashino | Template:Nihongo2 | Musashino fujin | ||
| 1952 | The Life of Oharu | Template:Nihongo2 | Saikaku ichidai onna | |
| 1953 | Ugetsu | Template:Nihongo2 | Ugetsu monogatari | |
| A Geisha | Template:Nihongo2 | Gion bayashi | ||
| 1954 | Sansho the Bailiff | Template:Nihongo2 | Sanshō dayū | |
| The Woman in the Rumor | Template:Nihongo2 | Uwasa no onna | ||
| The Crucified Lovers | Template:Nihongo2 | Chikamatsu monogatari | ||
| 1955 | Princess Yang Kwei Fei | Template:Nihongo2 | Yōkihi | |
| Tales of the Taira Clan | Template:Nihongo2 | Shin heike monogatari | ||
| 1956 | Street of Shame | Template:Nihongo2 | Akasen chitai |
LegacyEdit
In 1975, Kaneto Shindō, a set designer, chief assistant director and scenarist for Mizoguchi in the late 1930s and 1940s, released a documentary about his former mentor, Kenji Mizoguchi: The Life of a Film Director,<ref name="Shindo-DVD" /> as well as publishing a book on him in 1976.<ref name="shindo-bio">Template:Kaneto-shindo-aru-eiga-kantoku</ref> Already with his autobiographical debut film Story of a Beloved Wife (1951), Shindō had paid reference to Mizoguchi in the shape of the character "Sakaguchi",<ref name="Mellen2">Template:Cite book</ref> a director who nurtures a young aspiring screenwriter.
Mizoguchi's films have regularly appeared in "best film" polls, such as Sight & Sound's "The 100 Greatest Films of All Time" (Ugetsu and Sansho the Bailiff)<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> and Kinema Junpo's "Kinema Junpo Critics' Top 200" (The Life of Oharu, Ugetsu and The Crucified Lovers).<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> A retrospective of his 30 extant films, presented by the Museum of the Moving Image and the Japan Foundation, toured several American cities in 2014.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Among the directors who have admired Mizoguchi's work are Akira Kurosawa,<ref name="Richie1999">Template:Cite book</ref> Orson Welles,<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Andrei Tarkovsky,<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Martin Scorsese,<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Werner Herzog,<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Theo Angelopoulos<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> and many others. Film historian David Thomson wrote, "The use of camera to convey emotional ideas or intelligent feelings is the definition of cinema derived from Mizoguchi's films. He is supreme in the realization of internal states in external views."<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
ReferencesEdit
Further readingEdit
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External linksEdit
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