Scattered Clouds: The Films of Mikio Naruse
January 12, 2006 - February 18, 2006
© 1960 Toho Co., Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
"Happiness is a concept that was invented in the modern world," remarks a character in Mikio Naruse's 1952 film Lightning; the irony is that, more than any of the great Japanese directors whose equal he was—Mizoguchi, Ozu, and Kurosawa—Naruse's world is the modern world. It's just not very happy.
Kurosawa once characterized Naruse's style as being "like a great river with a calm surface and a raging current in its depths." Naruse's melodramas are character studies revealed in gestures, plots unfolding in a glance. Raised in poverty, he was drawn to those who live on the edge of society's comforts—whether emotional or economic—and so it is not surprising that his abiding subject is women, from the stultifying oppression of marriage to the tarnished rituals of the anachronistic geisha. The novelist Fumiko Hayashi was his favorite source for plots epitomizing his own vision that modern women are offered only illusory freedom. Audie Bock, who championed this relatively unheralded director years ago in her book Japanese Film Directors and in a monograph, writes of the "condition of trapped awareness" in Naruse's women. It is this awareness that gave actresses like Hideko Takamine, Kinuyo Tanaka, and Setsuko Hara a chance to show their depth.
On the occasion of the centenary of this marvelous director, we are pleased to bring back many PFA favorites along with films we have never had the opportunity to see. This is a chance to look at Naruse's work for its freshness—its genius at narrative construction, its visual style, its sophisticated and surprising humor—along with the themes of desire and escape that will never grow old.
Thursday, January 12, 2006
7:00 p.m. Nightly Dreams
Bruce Loeb on Piano. Naruse's early melodrama of a woman abandoned is a virtuoso display of camerawork and startling montage. With Flunky, Work Hard!, a lower-middle-class comedy that veers abruptly into tragedy.
Thursday, January 12, 2006
9:00 p.m. Tsuruhachi and Tsurujiro
Naruse brings emotion and wit to the story of the relationship between a samisen player and a ballad singer during the Meiji era. "A musical treat."—NFT, London
Saturday, January 14, 2006
7:00 p.m. Street Without End
Judith Rosenberg on Piano. With its sharp class awareness, feminist concerns, and richness of melodramatic incident, this silent saga about the loves of a waitress is classic Naruse.
Saturday, January 14, 2006
9:15 p.m. The Whole Family Works
Naruse's quiet drama of a family's struggle to make ends meet during the Depression and the war with China, whose social costs are never mentioned but keenly felt.
Sunday, January 15, 2006
5:30 p.m. Not Blood Relations
Judith Rosenberg on Piano. With a script by Kogo Noda, writer of many Ozu films, this is a compassionate and psychologically acute portrait of a woman trying to win back the daughter she gave up for adoption long ago.
Sunday, January 15, 2006
7:25 p.m. Traveling Actors
This atypically comic outing for Naruse follows an itinerant kabuki troupe, focusing on a pair of actors who play the two halves of a horse—until a real animal is hired for the part.
Thursday, January 19, 2006
7:00 p.m. Hideko the Bus Conductress
Hideko Takamine stars as the teenage ticket-taker for a bus line that has seen better days in this charming comedy, the first of her 17 films with Naruse.
Thursday, January 19, 2006
8:15 p.m. Ginza Cosmetics
"Not to be missed. Kinuyo Tanaka, best known for her roles in the films of Mizoguchi, is sensational in this portrait of a Ginza bar hostess."—Cinematheque Ontario
Saturday, January 21, 2006
7:00 p.m. The Song Lantern
A harsh tale set in the world of Noh theater, this film has chiaroscuro cinematography that would make von Sternberg envious.
Saturday, January 21, 2006
8:55 p.m. A Tale of Archers at the Sanjusangendo
Filmed during the final months of WWII, this Edo-period drama departs from Naruse's usual contemporary themes to portray the son of a great archer determined to become a champion bowman.
Sunday, January 22, 2006
5:30 p.m. Repast
Naruse's first adaptation of a Fumiko Hayashi novel eloquently portrays a crumbling marriage. Setsuko Hara stars.
Sunday, January 22, 2006
7:25 p.m. Mother
Naruse takes a complex, astringent approach to sentimental material for this story of a widow (Kinuyo Tanaka) struggling to maintain the family business.
Thursday, January 26, 2006
7:30 p.m. Lightning
Adapted from a Fumiko Hayashi novel, and starring Naruse's favorite actress, Hideko Takamine, as a pawn in her relatives' various schemes, this major work illuminates one of the director's key themes: entrapment within the family system. "A superbly wistful rendering of Hayashi's lowlife characters to the screen."—Audie Bock
Saturday, January 28, 2006
7:00 p.m. Husband and Wife
This sequel to Repast centers on the domestic troubles of a young couple forced to share a flat with an eccentric friend. As always, Naruse depicts lower-middle-class life with impressive frankness and psychological insight.
Saturday, January 28, 2006
8:45 p.m. Wife
Another affecting look at the everyday irritations of marriage, but with an atypical twist for Naruse—this time, the husband is the more sympathetic character.
Sunday, January 29, 2006
4:30 p.m. Older Brother, Younger Sister
Extraordinary performances by Machiko Kyo and Masayuki Mori in a "tense study of suppressed emotions and rivalries . . . Abandoning his characteristic restraint, Naruse creates a melodrama of harrowing intensity."—Film Center, Chicago
Sunday, January 29, 2006
6:15 p.m. Late Chrysanthemums
A compelling character study of four aging geishas contemplating their troubles with men and money. "A gem. . . . With delicate, unobtrusive strokes, Naruse evokes both the humor and bitterness in his characters' dilemmas."—S.F. Chronicle
Thursday, February 2, 2006
7:30 p.m. Sound of the Mountain
Mistreated wife Setsuko Hara forges a close and complex relationship with father-in-law So Yamamura in Naruse's adaptation of the famous Kawabata novel. "Exquisite."—Boston Phoenix
Saturday, February 4, 2006
7:00 p.m. Flowing
It's hard to find a more impressive trio of actresses than Hideko Takamine, Kinuyo Tanaka, and Isuzu Yamada. Naruse's tale of geishas in decline is "a tangle of subtle relationships. . . . Quietly brilliant filmmaking."—Village Voice
Saturday, February 4, 2006
9:15 p.m. Floating Clouds
This epic story of wartime lovers separated by a wretched peace is a richly evocative portrait of postwar Tokyo and an endlessly fascinating character study. Revered in Japan as the ultimate masterpiece of the director's career, and a high point for star Hideko Takamine.
Sunday, February 5, 2006
4:30 p.m. Sudden Rain
Everyday life of a marriage: "A masterpiece in miniature. . . . Naruse's complex touches are brilliant."—IFC News
Sunday, February 5, 2006
6:20 p.m. A Wife’s Heart
Money and family are persistent Naruse themes, here revolving around Hideko Takamine as a young wife.
Thursday, February 9, 2006
7:30 p.m. Summer Clouds
The country makes an unusual setting for Naruse, known for his city films, and the lyrical, open-air feeling of this color, 'Scope film almost hides the defeat that permeates the story of a woman trying to be independent of her traditional farming family. Chikage Awashima, better known for her Ozu roles, stars.
Saturday, February 11, 2006
7:00 p.m. Anzukko
So Yamamura shines as the kindly father of a young woman trapped in a disastrous marriage.
Saturday, February 11, 2006
9:10 p.m. When a Woman Ascends the Stairs
Essential Naruse. "An elegant essay in black-and-white CinemaScope and tinkling cocktail jazz, this tale of a bar hostess's attempt to escape her lot could give heartbreak lessons to Fassbinder and Sirk."—Village Voice
Sunday, February 12, 2006
4:30 p.m. The Approach of Autumn
A young widow and her shy sixth-grader relocate to Tokyo. "A rare and masterful focus on children for Naruse."—Film Forum
Sunday, February 12, 2006
6:10 p.m. Daughters, Wives, and a Mother
A stellar cast in a saga of a comfortable suburban family's unraveling after the family home is mortgaged.
Thursday, February 16, 2006
7:30 p.m. Her Lonely Lane
A revealing biopic, based on the journals of Fumiko Hayashi, the writer Naruse most frequently adapted, and starring his favorite actress Hideko Takamine, who gives an "amazingly detailed, unglamorized portrait of the writer . . . imbued with a strong passion for life and writing."—NFT, London
Saturday, February 18, 2006
7:00 p.m. Yearning
A war widow keeps the family store and her heart in check long after she should have remarried. "Whatever else it is—a critique of the economics of the family, among other things—Yearning is also a poem on the beauty of Hideko Takamine, in the next-to-last of the 17 films she did with Naruse."—Boston Phoenix
Saturday, February 18, 2006
9:00 p.m. Scattered Clouds
In Naruse's last film, made when he already knew he was dying, "a woman recently widowed finds herself forced from all sides to embark on a new relationship before she's emotionally ready—a fateful mishap of timing . . ."—Boston Phoenix
This touring series was organized by James Quandt, Cinematheque Ontario. We are indebted to The Japan Foundation for preparing and loaning prints; a special thanks to Marie Suzuki in the Foundation's Tokyo office. Thanks also to Akira Tochigi, The National Film Center of The National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo; Toho International, Tokyo and Los Angeles; Sarah Finklea, Janus Films, New York; Kokusai Hoei Co., Ltd.; Kadokawa Pictures, Inc.; George Kaltsounakis, Cinematheque Ontario; Roland de la Rosa, Movie Image; and Richard Tsina.
We are grateful to Owsley Brown III for his generous support.
Archival and restored prints and musicians for silent films are presented with support from the Packard Humanities Institute.
Program notes compiled by Judy Bloch, Juliet Clark, and Jason Sanders.
