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Thursday, August 27, 2009
Mezamashii: Kinuyo Tanaka in Sandakan 8 (with Bonus Oscar Trivia!)
BeRightBack here, visiting from the Wordsmoker Collective to blither about Japanese cinema again! Today, I want to talk a bit about great Japanese actress (and first studio-backed Japanese female director!) Kinuyo Tanaka. Specifically, I want to look at her last major role, in 1974's Sandakan 8, which was in the running the following year (upon its international release) for the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film.
Sandakan 8 is an issue-driven movie dramatizing the then-little-known phenomenon of the "karayuki-san," a practice by which young girls from the countryside were sold into prostitution in foreign lands by desperately poor Japanese families. The government tacitly condoned the practice, as it was a way for Japanese "business interests" to gain a foothold in places marked for future colonization or annexation. Tanaka plays a former karayuki-san who is being courted by a young female "women's studies scholar" who is interested in her story.
Sandakan 8's strengths do not lie in its filmic qualities. The double-flashback narrative frame distances the audience in an unhelpful way, making the dramatization of the karayuki-san's exploitation seem luridly predictable rather than viscerally shocking or moving, and the script's reliance on melodramatic cliché in its narrative arc does little to detract from the grinding, Stations-of-the-Cross-esque pacing.
What makes Sandakan 8 a joy to watch even today, though, are the performances by its female leads: Komaki Kurihara's grace in the thankless role as the young, idealistic scholar; Yoko Takashi's refusal to indulge in the bathos the script urges on her as she plays the karayuki-san as a young girl; and, above all, Kinuyo Tanaka's disarming, funny, and emotionally fluid turn as the former karayuki-san confronting the loneliness and wisdom her past traumas have bequeathed her.
Tanaka makes the unusual and extremely effective decision to play her character as a woman who has been through so much that she has lost any desire to hide her feelings. As the film relentlessly shows us, she is a woman who has lost everything. Tanaka's choice conveys that this has resulted not in bitterness, but in an almost alarming openness to whatever meager joys come her way. It makes her character both childlike and wise, tragic yet joyful as she clings to the companionship the woman scholar provides. Every emotion the character experiences plays across Tanaka's face like dye dropped into clear water.
While the film is not currently available on DVD (the graininess of these screengrabs is due to the fact that the only copy I could find was transferred from a VHS tape), I did find a Youtube clip of the final scene between Tanaka and Kurihara that demonstrates better than any screengrab the quicksilver emotional beats Tanaka hits every second she's onscreen.
Tanaka won Best Actress at the Berlin International Film Festival that year, and, as I mentioned before, the film was also nominated for the Foreign Language Film Oscar. In a rather odd twist, the film it lost out to that year was Dersu Uzala, the submission from the Soviet Union – a film directed by Akira Kurosawa!
Does anyone recall if this has happened before or since - a film nominated by one country being beaten by a film submitted by another country that was directed by a national of the former, not the latter, country? Can this question get more convoluted?
Sandakan 8 is an issue-driven movie dramatizing the then-little-known phenomenon of the "karayuki-san," a practice by which young girls from the countryside were sold into prostitution in foreign lands by desperately poor Japanese families. The government tacitly condoned the practice, as it was a way for Japanese "business interests" to gain a foothold in places marked for future colonization or annexation. Tanaka plays a former karayuki-san who is being courted by a young female "women's studies scholar" who is interested in her story.
Sandakan 8's strengths do not lie in its filmic qualities. The double-flashback narrative frame distances the audience in an unhelpful way, making the dramatization of the karayuki-san's exploitation seem luridly predictable rather than viscerally shocking or moving, and the script's reliance on melodramatic cliché in its narrative arc does little to detract from the grinding, Stations-of-the-Cross-esque pacing.
What makes Sandakan 8 a joy to watch even today, though, are the performances by its female leads: Komaki Kurihara's grace in the thankless role as the young, idealistic scholar; Yoko Takashi's refusal to indulge in the bathos the script urges on her as she plays the karayuki-san as a young girl; and, above all, Kinuyo Tanaka's disarming, funny, and emotionally fluid turn as the former karayuki-san confronting the loneliness and wisdom her past traumas have bequeathed her.
Tanaka makes the unusual and extremely effective decision to play her character as a woman who has been through so much that she has lost any desire to hide her feelings. As the film relentlessly shows us, she is a woman who has lost everything. Tanaka's choice conveys that this has resulted not in bitterness, but in an almost alarming openness to whatever meager joys come her way. It makes her character both childlike and wise, tragic yet joyful as she clings to the companionship the woman scholar provides. Every emotion the character experiences plays across Tanaka's face like dye dropped into clear water.
While the film is not currently available on DVD (the graininess of these screengrabs is due to the fact that the only copy I could find was transferred from a VHS tape), I did find a Youtube clip of the final scene between Tanaka and Kurihara that demonstrates better than any screengrab the quicksilver emotional beats Tanaka hits every second she's onscreen.Tanaka won Best Actress at the Berlin International Film Festival that year, and, as I mentioned before, the film was also nominated for the Foreign Language Film Oscar. In a rather odd twist, the film it lost out to that year was Dersu Uzala, the submission from the Soviet Union – a film directed by Akira Kurosawa!
Does anyone recall if this has happened before or since - a film nominated by one country being beaten by a film submitted by another country that was directed by a national of the former, not the latter, country? Can this question get more convoluted?
Let's hear it for the ladies.
Robert here, remembering back when the whole 10 Best Picture nominees boondoggle was hitting someone aptly noted that if all or several of the high profile Oscar-worthy films this year directed by women make the Best Picture list, but none of their directors make that much shorter list, The Academy will have some explaining to do.Truly 2009 is shaping up to be a great year for female directors. And while that stretches well beyond our shores to such formidable talents as Agnes Varda and Clair Denis (who I am in love with) let's look at this through the prism of the Oscars for now.
We already know from the festival circuit that Jane Campion and Lone Scherfig have Oscar-ready films poised to snag acting and tech awards. Kathryn Bigelow has directed one of the, if not the best reviewed films of the summer. And, like it or not, Mira Nair's Amelia is as Oscar-baity as they come starring one of their favorite actresses (sorry Nathaniel) in a big old biopic.
So the question I pose is this: Who makes the cut?
F&L 50
The first image after the opening titles actual title card and the last image before the credits scroll.
Can you guess the movie?
You may have loved it as a child [highlight for the answer]: CHITTY CHITTY BANG BANG (1968) for more first and last puzzles, click the label below.
*
Can you guess the movie?
You may have loved it as a child [highlight for the answer]: CHITTY CHITTY BANG BANG (1968) for more first and last puzzles, click the label below.
*
Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Someday Her Prince Will Succumb
Remember that awesome Disney Princes gallery? The one where the underexploited toon men were suddenly objectified? Here's what you might consider a subversive counterpart. Jeffrey Thomas has imagined Disney's heavily marketed Princesses -- not all of them actual royals but amply exploited by Disney all the same -- exploring their darkest sides.
It didn't take much twisting to make Belle fierce. She was always formidable, y'know. And then there's Alice (Don't judge! Who wouldn't go criminally insane in Wonderland?). Thomas' gallery, which Loyal K*N*G pointed me too, also includes Cinderella in a rotting pumpkin, Mulan looking fierce, Pocahontas on the hunt (clean that knife girl!) and Tarzan's Jane wearing a cheetah (no not "Cheetah" dear god, not that). See the whole thing.
By the way, if you loved that eroticized Prince gallery that I told you about early last year, you should know that artist David Kwaena has expanded the gallery. In addition to new 2D men, he's added live-action hunks like Will Turner from the Pirates of the Caribbean movies, Zac Efron from the High School Musical franchise and James Marsden's goofy Prince Edward from Enchanted (pictured left, but why isn't he biting his fist? Why?!? That's the best part!) Check it out.
It didn't take much twisting to make Belle fierce. She was always formidable, y'know. And then there's Alice (Don't judge! Who wouldn't go criminally insane in Wonderland?). Thomas' gallery, which Loyal K*N*G pointed me too, also includes Cinderella in a rotting pumpkin, Mulan looking fierce, Pocahontas on the hunt (clean that knife girl!) and Tarzan's Jane wearing a cheetah (no not "Cheetah" dear god, not that). See the whole thing.
By the way, if you loved that eroticized Prince gallery that I told you about early last year, you should know that artist David Kwaena has expanded the gallery. In addition to new 2D men, he's added live-action hunks like Will Turner from the Pirates of the Caribbean movies, Zac Efron from the High School Musical franchise and James Marsden's goofy Prince Edward from Enchanted (pictured left, but why isn't he biting his fist? Why?!? That's the best part!) Check it out.
"Your Girl is Lovely, Hubbell"
Robert Redford is in the air. He hasn't dissolved into something atmospheric (stop being so literal!) but his name keeps turning up. Last week his two early sexually fluid performances opposite Natalie Wood (This Property is Condemned and Inside Daisy Clover) were playing here in New York and next month in Brooklyn BAM Cinema hosts a retrospective. It culminates on September 13th with four films and the Sundance Kid himself in person. For whatever reason they've narrowed down the final four to Redford as romantic figure, often paired with true giants among actresses.On the last day they're screening...
- Out of Africa (1985) The Best Picture winning bio in which Redford can't be tamed by Meryl Streep's author/heroine but gladly offers up shampoo and stud services.
- The Natural (1984) this prestige pic is a mythic baseball drama. Redford and cast are bathed in Caleb Deschanel lensed sunshine and the lovely ladies include then rising stars Barbara Hershey, Glenn Close (Oscar nominated here... though I'm still not sure why) and Kim Basinger.
- The Electric Horseman (1979) Redford and Jane Fonda fall in love at the rodeo. And compete in a Best Feathered Hair competition.
- The Way We Were (1973) in which Barba Streisand falls hard for Redford but McCarthy era Hollywood tears them apart
Here's the difficult part: You can only choose one. They screen simultaneously, somewhat staggered due to running times, and then the man himself appears to talk about his career to the moviegoing crowd. I'm tempted to go Horseman (the only one I haven't seen) but The Way We Were is easily my favorite among those films. It's so underrated and much more expansive than its veneration as Classic Chick Flick suggests. If you ask me, Barbra Streisand deserved the Oscar in 73. Her chemistry with Redford is every bit as remarkable as you've heard. No wonder Carrie Bradshaw obsessed so.*
F&L 49
First and Last: the first image after the opening credits and the last shot before the final credit scroll.
Can you guess the movie? Oscar winning cinematography by Robert Krasker who went on to lens El Cid and Billy Budd, too.
[highlight for the answer]: The Third Man (1949) for more first and last puzzles, click the label below.
[highlight for the answer]: The Third Man (1949) for more first and last puzzles, click the label below.
*
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
"Bye Bye Birdie... guess I'll always caaaAAAaaAAare"
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If you've been following my Twitter Feed you know that I've had "Bye Bye Birdie" stuck in my head. And you also know why. So, today on the subway I made this "shrill" little iPhone drawing of the one & only Ann-Margret. It doesn't look like her exactly but I was drawing from memory... and the train was moving.Bye Bye Birdie,Can I just say that it's hard to draw with sweaty fingers on an iPhone on a subway car in August. I felt like a giant finger painting on a postage stamp sized canvas. It wasn't meant to be this way! My finger has never felt like such a lumpy graceless thing as when I've tried to learn"Brushes" for the iPhone (like presumably many other people I was roped in by that New Yorker cover made entirely on an iPhone... remember that?).
It's awful hard to bear;
Bye Bye Birdie
Think I'll always care,
Guess I'll always care,
Guess I'll always care!
What song is stuck in your head lately?
And do you ever doodle on your electronic devices?
*
Where My Heart Lies: My Favorite Actors. And Yours?
instead of a tues top 10, a 25.
I did this once for the actresses but I'm always giving the ladies their due. So, here's to the silver screen men that have enriched my movie-life. I admit up front that I haven't investigated Classic Hollywood actors to the extent I've investigated their leading ladies, so this list is highly subject to change the more old movies I see in my life.
Because sometimes you just want to name names
The list is not comprehensive, not set in stone, not entirely defendable. But they're the ones I love best. The ones I somehow feel are mine. Not that you can't share them.
Post your top 20 at your personal web home -- no explanations necessary, just photos -- and I'll link up!
P.S. 1 I'm already pretty sure I forgot someone important
P.S. 2 Your lists go here... send me your links.
A Blogwork Orange mixes icons like Bogie with modern tastes like Buscemi
Award Talk likes the formal gentlemen Ralph Fiennes, Sir Laurence Olivier and Leslie Howard. and other staples like Clark Gable and Cary Grant
Encore Entertainment gives props to greats that just missed my list like Ed Harris, Albert Finney and Dustin Hoffman
Runs Like a Gay goes retro with James Mason, Spencer Tracy and Alec Guinness
All That Film classics Astaire & O'Toole /modern giants Penn & DiCaprio
Cheerful Cynicism has a quirky mix including Yul Brynner (love!), Clark Gable (I didn't use to like him... but I'm slowly converting I must say), Hugh Jackman and more...
A Cinema Neophyte mostly modern with inspired choices and good pics
Journalistic Skepticism Penn, Hanks, Brando, Stewart and Jack lead
Many Rantings of John ranks his list. Douglas places. Welles and Brando rule
For Your Speculation gives a shout out to some typically supporting guys: Delroy Lindo, Chris Cooper and Peter Sarsgaard. Well played
Theme For Great Cities Bardem, Crudup and Strathairn... oh my
City of Angels ooh, Anthony Perkins and Claude Rains. Yay.
Sorta That Guy covers his favorites: Bernal, Gosling, Franco, Cheadle
Nick's Flick Picks tiered favorites. Chaplin. Fredric March & Sean Penn
Douglas Racso a wondrously international grab bag: Coco Martin, Max von Sydow, Daniel Auteuil, Gael García Bernal, Sir Ian McKellen
Film Away recently went mad for movies: Depp, Foxx, Clooney, Pacino
Reel Artsy Joaquin, Josh, Takeshi (sigh), Tobey
Rants of a Diva did his list ages ago. What took me so long?
A Blog Next Door calls his list "hodgepodge"... Caine, Broadbent, Owen, Marsden
Ferdy on Films is magnetized by Rudolph Valentino's eyes among others: Keir Dullea, Eduardo Noriega, Charles Durning
StinkyLulu is, like me, a dedicated actressexual. But we manage to find room for a few screen gods in our devotions all the same. Can you name the actor and the role?
Situated Laundry makes a vanilla bingo board and adds stage actors. I approve
Gratia Artis Peter Lorre, Charles Laughton, Robert Mitchum
The Sheila Variations ranks them. Mickey Rourke is back on top. Stockwell, Widmark, Duvall and Cooper also place.
new BookeyWookey Oleg Menshikov, Matthieu Kassovitz and Romain Duris. Mmmm x 3
newest Goatdog Penn and Cagney reign
*
I did this once for the actresses but I'm always giving the ladies their due. So, here's to the silver screen men that have enriched my movie-life. I admit up front that I haven't investigated Classic Hollywood actors to the extent I've investigated their leading ladies, so this list is highly subject to change the more old movies I see in my life.
Nathaniel's 25 all time favorite leading men
In no particular order and extremely subject to change
In no particular order and extremely subject to change
Gene Kelly | Tony Leung Chiu-Wai |
Montgomery Clift | Jeff Bridges | Paul Newman
Montgomery Clift | Jeff Bridges | Paul Newman
Jude Law | James Dean | William Holden | Gene Hackman | Rock Hudson
Jack Lemmon | Gael García Bernal | Ewan McGregor | James Stewart | Gregory Peck
Steve Martin | Marlon Brando | Jack Nicholson | Burt Lancaster | Richard Burton
Brad Pitt | Johnny Depp | Cary Grant | Warren Beatty | William Hurt
Jack Lemmon | Gael García Bernal | Ewan McGregor | James Stewart | Gregory Peck
Steve Martin | Marlon Brando | Jack Nicholson | Burt Lancaster | Richard Burton
Brad Pitt | Johnny Depp | Cary Grant | Warren Beatty | William Hurt
Because sometimes you just want to name names
The list is not comprehensive, not set in stone, not entirely defendable. But they're the ones I love best. The ones I somehow feel are mine. Not that you can't share them.
Post your top 20 at your personal web home -- no explanations necessary, just photos -- and I'll link up!
P.S. 1 I'm already pretty sure I forgot someone important
P.S. 2 Your lists go here... send me your links.
A Blogwork Orange mixes icons like Bogie with modern tastes like Buscemi
Award Talk likes the formal gentlemen Ralph Fiennes, Sir Laurence Olivier and Leslie Howard. and other staples like Clark Gable and Cary Grant
Encore Entertainment gives props to greats that just missed my list like Ed Harris, Albert Finney and Dustin Hoffman
Runs Like a Gay goes retro with James Mason, Spencer Tracy and Alec Guinness
All That Film classics Astaire & O'Toole /modern giants Penn & DiCaprio
Cheerful Cynicism has a quirky mix including Yul Brynner (love!), Clark Gable (I didn't use to like him... but I'm slowly converting I must say), Hugh Jackman and more...
A Cinema Neophyte mostly modern with inspired choices and good pics
Journalistic Skepticism Penn, Hanks, Brando, Stewart and Jack lead
Many Rantings of John ranks his list. Douglas places. Welles and Brando rule
For Your Speculation gives a shout out to some typically supporting guys: Delroy Lindo, Chris Cooper and Peter Sarsgaard. Well played
Theme For Great Cities Bardem, Crudup and Strathairn... oh my
City of Angels ooh, Anthony Perkins and Claude Rains. Yay.
Sorta That Guy covers his favorites: Bernal, Gosling, Franco, Cheadle
Nick's Flick Picks tiered favorites. Chaplin. Fredric March & Sean Penn
Douglas Racso a wondrously international grab bag: Coco Martin, Max von Sydow, Daniel Auteuil, Gael García Bernal, Sir Ian McKellen
Film Away recently went mad for movies: Depp, Foxx, Clooney, Pacino
Reel Artsy Joaquin, Josh, Takeshi (sigh), Tobey
Rants of a Diva did his list ages ago. What took me so long?
A Blog Next Door calls his list "hodgepodge"... Caine, Broadbent, Owen, Marsden
Ferdy on Films is magnetized by Rudolph Valentino's eyes among others: Keir Dullea, Eduardo Noriega, Charles Durning
StinkyLulu is, like me, a dedicated actressexual. But we manage to find room for a few screen gods in our devotions all the same. Can you name the actor and the role?
Situated Laundry makes a vanilla bingo board and adds stage actors. I approve
Gratia Artis Peter Lorre, Charles Laughton, Robert Mitchum
The Sheila Variations ranks them. Mickey Rourke is back on top. Stockwell, Widmark, Duvall and Cooper also place.
new BookeyWookey Oleg Menshikov, Matthieu Kassovitz and Romain Duris. Mmmm x 3
newest Goatdog Penn and Cagney reign
*
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