309 Ugetsu

[Michael Kerpan]

All I can say, Gregory, is that Shindo's film rubs me (very much) the wrong way. I find the tone peculiar and unpleasant. Yes, Shindo did have proefessional credentials at this point -- yet his attitude seems remarkably perverse and juvenile -- very much that of a fanboy. (The film also strikes me as poorly structured and poorly focused).

There is a weird combination here of idol worship and sniggering at the a few of the "dirty bits" of the Mizoguchi story. It certainly isn't as blatant a biographical whitewash as Le Fanu's recent book (which ironically is also execrably structured and mis-focused).

Not sure what _I_ would have done with the assets Shindo had available at the time he made the film. Nonetheless, I can still find it both amateurish and creepy. (Sorry to provide such an unsatisfactory answer).

I must confess my negativity to this film is colored by my hostility to the cheesy and trashy Shindo-written (Ichikawa-directed) movie -- Eiga joyu (1987) --made to exploit the tenth anniversary of Tanaka's death.

It is useful to have this (essentially as a freebie) -- but it realy is quite a bad job compared to the rather nice "I Lived But" (which looked back at Ozu and his films).

[Gregory]

There is a weird combination here of idol worship and sniggering at the a few of the "dirty bits" of the Mizoguchi story.

I do know what you mean about that, but at the same time I find it understandable. From my own experience doing oral history interviews I know how hard it often is to bring up unpleasant or controversial personal topics with an interviewee. For the sake of their own peace of mind, a person will have made their own peace with something difficult on scandalous (on their part or someone else's) and put it to rest long ago. Therefore, they resist dredging it up again. A related source of reticence is the idea most people have that it's more gracious to say little than to say much, even if saying more add some valuable things to the documentary record. Most people figure it's bad form to speak ill of the dead, and such. So sometimes the most you can get is an acknowledgement of something that both the interviewer and the subject know to be true. I think that's why there are certain moments in the film when Shindo and the interviewees take pause from praising Mizoguchi's talents and achievements for things like, "He loved women, very much," "Oh yes, he certainly did" (wink, wink) -- next topic.

[whaleallright]

I spent the last hour imitating the interviewers obnoxious grunting sounds....what's up with that?

It's a social convention in Japan to acknowledge the person with whom you're speaking by nodding and making small noises (more like "hmm" than a grunt)--you might be considered rude, or at least inattentive, otherwise. Nearly every Japanese documentary I've seen reflects this. One advantage of recognizing this is you begin to realize that the offscreen silence that accompanies talking heads in Western documentaries is an artefact of our own social conventions.

But I agree, Shindo seems more enthusiastic than most.

[Michael Kerpan]

The behavior is so extreme here that I believe it would be considered weird by Japanese too. I have listened to many other interviews in Japanese -- and while these ARE peppered by frequent interjections of "uh" and ""so ka" and the like -- I have never seen/heard anything else remotely like this.

[jguitar]

I'd have to disagree here. I've often heard conversations among Japanese that approach Shindo's, shall we say enthusiastic, level of phatic speech here. One thing to remember is that Shindo knows many of the interview subjects quite well--he's not some outsider come to interview people he's never met before. One thing I like about this documentary is when Shindo is interviewing various film craftsmen about how they got a certain effect, or details about the nitty gritty of a shoot. There is an evident joy in the conversation, like two veterans remembering a difficult but successful campaign. This is not to quibble with the critical comments about the documentary itself which leaves much to be desired. But for what it is, it does give us a unique look into the Japanese film industry.

[Michael Kerpan]

One can compare the speaking style here to that in the relatively informal conversation/interview of the Ozu old-timers -- included in the "Early Summer" set. These are old friends and movie-making insiders -- and they display plenty of enthusiasm -- but this sounds very little like Shindo's conversations with Mizoguchi's associates. ;~}

[jguitar]

Good point Michael. I'm just saying that I've certainly heard similar kinds of interactions among Japanese quite often. To me, it seems within the range of normal.

[whaleallright]

Title of Ugetsu in Kanji: 雨月物語

雨月/ [rain][moon]

物語 / [tales]

How did some translators get to "Tales of the Pale and Silvery Moon after the Rain" or "Tales of the Pale and Mysterious Moon after the Rain" from this? Wouldn't it simply be (reading from right to left) "Tales of the Moon and Rain"? Or am I missing certain nuances of the language?

[bunuelian]

Although it's not Japanese, I spent a lot of time studying Chinese in college. Literary Chinese is capable of expressing extraordinarily complex ideas with very few characters, and words like rain and moon can be broadly interpreted according to context and literary allusion. The rain moon characters could appear together only as part of another saying, a bit like saying, "The grass is always greener," but leaving out "on the other side of the fence." I'd be surprised if Japanese worked differently.

On the other hand, this could just be some overconfident Nipponophile's regurgitation of standard western obfuscation in the face of the east's difficult literary tradition. Throwing around "mysterious" and "pale" sells copy.

[Scharphedin2]

I have a book at home that addresses these issues (I will post the title of it later). As I remember it, the thing about the Japanese characters is that they communicate not only a literal mening, but also a visual and a aural meaning. Therefore, each combination of characters can carry many nuances of meaning.

As an example the book quoted a passage from a novel by Tanizaki, which had been translated by three noted Western scholars. One translation was very literal and ran apx. 4 lines. Another translation was more detailed, and was about a paragraph long. The final translation was exceptionally detailed and descriptive, and took up a good half page of English text.

[Jimaku]

How did some translators get to "Tales of the Pale and Silvery Moon after the Rain" or "Tales of the Pale and Mysterious Moon after the Rain" from this? Wouldn't it simply be (reading from right to left) "Tales of the Moon and Rain"? Or am I missing certain nuances of the language?

These are fanciful elaborations.

In classical Japanese poetry 雨月 referred to the 15th night of the 8th lunar month, when the full moon was often occluded by rain. It can also refer more generically to the moon on a rainy night. In haiku this is a "kigo" or seasonal word that signifies autumn (the 8th lunar month is in the autumn).

To make matters confusing, however, it was also another term for the 5th lunar month, which was when the rainy season occurred.

In the case of the film and the Ueda Akinari collection on which it is based, the reference is most likely just to the generic moon and rain, though we may surmise from the storyline that it takes place in the autumn and not in the rainy season.

"Tales of Moonlight and Rain" or "Tales of the Moonlight After the Rain" seem to me to be reasonable compromises between the overblown examples you just quoted and the excessively literal translationese of "Tales of the Moon and Rain."

[Sanjuro]

Is the commentary track included on the Shindo documentary? I haven't listened to it yet (and it doesn't have subtitles on the Japanese DVD so might take a while) but it'd be interesting to hear what he has to say about it with hindsight.

It struck me as odd that a documentary like this would include a commentary track from the director so I guess he has some pretty strong feelings about it (there aren't any commentary tracks on the other DVDs of his that I've seen).

[kinjitsu]

Is the commentary track included on the Shindo documentary?

No, but there are a few comments in this thread.

Donald Richie reviews Anthony Chambers' translation of Ueda Akinari's Tales of Moonlight and Rain in The Japan Times.

[unclehulot]

Apparently the following Mizoguchi films are scheduled for production in 2007 by a company called Digital Meme.

Taki no Shiraito (The Water Magician) 1933
Orizuru Osen (Osen of the Paper Cranes) 1934

[Jeff]

It's good to know that Janus has those. I wonder what the chances are that Rialto will re-release some or all of those across the country. I'm not sure how Rialto chooses its films, but they sure are heavy on French cinema.

Rialto won't actually release any of those. Janus will release them themselves. Rialto doesn't release Janus properties; Criterion licenses Rialto properties.

Before Criterion decided to reinvigorate the Janus brand, and self-distribute their films theatrically, they had a distribution arrangement with the now-defunct Cowboy Pictures.

Rialto, on the other hand is an American theatrical distributor that licenses foreign-owned films for theatrical distribution, and then sub-licenses them to Criterion for DVD release (except when the video rights are held by other companies). The vast majority of the films Rialto releases are owned by StudioCanal, which explains the preponderance of Frenchies.

[the dancing kid]

Apparently the following Mizoguchi films are scheduled for production in 2007 by a company called Digital Meme.

Taki no Shiraito (The Water Magician) 1933
Orizuru Osen (Osen of the Paper Cranes) 1934

That website claims that they're also releasing 'Orochi', which is great news. I don't know if that film has ever been officially released anywhere, but it's a really important piece of film history. I wonder what their source material looks like and whether or not it will include benshi narration.

[Steven H]

Apparently the following Mizoguchi films are scheduled for production in 2007 by a company called Digital Meme.

Taki no Shiraito (The Water Magician) 1933
Orizuru Osen (Osen of the Paper Cranes) 1934

Fantastic news! I can only hope they're paired together, as it might reduce the price. They also have a four disc collection of classic anime listed as "upcoming" which has my name all over it. Great find, unclehulot.

[Michael Kerpan]

I think Orochi was available on video (with benshi narration -- but not subtitles) from Matsuda in Japan.

[Narshty]

A big fat let-down. I can't see what's so exemplary about Ugetsu to warrant the praise it's garnered. There doesn't appear to be anything terribly exciting about it - the performances are all quite good but nothing remotely standout (mind you, no character is offered more than two dimensions) and the script's structure and uneven pace is pretty weak. I agree the plot is terribly schematic and there's just no room for anything to breathe, despite the occasional longeurs during the film.

[Gigi M.]

A big fat let-down. I can't see what's so exemplary about Ugetsu to warrant the praise it's garnered. There doesn't appear to be anything especially exemplary about it - the performances are all quite good but nothing remotely standout (mind you, no character is offered more than two dimensions) and the script's structure and uneven pace is pretty weak. I agree the plot is terribly schematic and there's just no room for anything to breathe, despite the occasional longeurs during the film.

I guess I didn't watch the same film.

[Michael]

Ugetsu does suffer from the somewhat ridiculous side with Tobei. Its slapstick humor doesn't sit well with me...it feels like it was cut from another film and forced to be sewed up with Genjuro's completely enthereal story of superatural, eternal love and poetry. The last 10 or 15 minutes made me forget about Tobei and forgive the film.

[Lino]

This is a movie that needs to be watched more than once. I had pretty much your reaction at first but since then, it's grown on me and I am slowly beginning to see just why it's so beautifully done and quite apart from the rest of Mizoguchi's work.

[Narshty]

Ugetsu does suffer from the somewhat ridiculous side with Tobei. Its slapstick humor doesn't sit well with me...it feels like it was cut from another film and forced to be sewed up with Genjuro's completely enthereal story of superatural, eternal love and poetry. The last 10 or 15 minutes made me forget about Tobei and forgive the film.

That's odd, because I felt Tobei's story held far greater potential for its own film than Genjuro's, which is as old as the hills and had an ending that even someone narratively illiterate like myself could see coming. For a director revered for his attention and compassion for women, I found the short shrift in terms of character, logic and everything else given to Tobei's wife mystifying. One scene she's recovering from an apparent gang rape, then she meets Tobei in her brothel workplace and shouts at him, then they're back together happily and all's well. No bridging scenes between these three instances whatsoever. It doesn't ring remotely true and reminded me (horror of horrors) of the Love Actually "who cares about the middle bits?" technique of storytelling. The slow pace these were played did not gel with the truncated storytelling.

The attempt to blend the supernatural with the "real world" never really came over. You can sit there and state one of your characters is a ghost till you're blue in the face, but if she doesn't do anything terribly ghostly (staring intently doesn't count), it's all for naught. I kept waiting for something to make the hairs on my neck stand up, but...nothing. The lack of atmosphere was a major problem, from the lake scene (which Tobei inadvertently reveals to be about four feet deep when he punts off at the end) to the final "return home", my heckles remained disappointingly in place.

I've not seen anything else by Mizoguchi (and this hasn't put me off at all, I hasten to add), but this can't be his "crowning achievement".

[Michael]

Well Tobei's acting annoyed the hell out of me. It seemed fake, forced and exagerrated. Not consistent with the rest of the cast. Not in the harmony with the film itself. A distraction.

Anyway, my favorite moment of the whole film is the Lady ghost singing with the fan. The atmosphere of that moment is simple but overwhelming. Eerie, powerful.

[Michael Kerpan]

The Tobei and wife sub-plot _could_ have been good -- but was handled rather poorly. My only other criticism is that Kinuyo Tanaka's role was so generic that it didn't require of her stature and talent to portray it. I think the Ghost Princess episode is mostly magnificent