A Critical Handbook of Japanese Film Directors. Alexander Jacoby

the Internet has made things a little better, but its resources are often flawed: dates are mistaken or absent; filmographies are incomplete or untranslated. Likewise, critical information about the films is often scanty, or scattered in various books and journals.

      With this book, therefore, I have set out to do two things. My first aim is to provide accurate factual information: names, dates, and filmographies. The filmographies are intended to list all films made for cinema release by each director, and in practice are as complete as available information allows. Films are included that were released or screened in festivals up to the end of 2007, when the final draft of this book was submitted for editing. The dates given are those of the first public screenings, in so far as I can trace them. The titles have been transliterated from original Japanese sources and translated into English with the aid of native speakers. My second aim is to provide a concise description of the themes and style of each director. While excellent histories of the Japanese cinema do exist, and while a handful of the most famous directors have enjoyed detailed book-length studies of their work, there is still no book which attempts to offer a comprehensive introduction to the work of the major directors from every period of the Japanese cinema. This book, I hope, will fill that niche. In doing so, I want to show that the acknowledged masters of Japanese cinema were not isolated figures of genius, but were the leaders of a large group of individual artists—some of them still unknown to most in the West—who, from the silent era to the present day, have shaped the unique contours of a national cinema.

      This book, therefore, includes profiles and filmographies for more than 150 Japanese filmmakers at work in live-action cinema between the silent era and the present day. I have focused mainly on directors of feature-length narrative film, which I believe is likely to be the main interest of most readers. I have, however, included the most important directors of documentary films. Directos notable for experimental or short films have been included if they have also made distinguished features. Thus, Nobuhiko Ōbayashi and Toshio Matsumoto have made experimental shorts and narrative features; Torajirō Saitō is best-known for his comedy shorts, but made feature-length films too. The majority of directors represented here, however, have worked or are working in the medium of the narrative fiction film, whether active in the studio system or independently.

      There are two conscious omissions. For reasons of space, I have chosen to confine my focus to directors making films for theatrical release. Directors working exclusively for television have been excluded. Where directors have made films for both the big and the small screen, I have discussed important television projects in the profiles, but I have not generally listed television work in the filmographies. Films made for straight-to-video release have likewise generally been excluded. However, this distinction has become less meaningful in recent years since films made primarily for television or video sometimes receive limited cinema releases as well, or are shown on cinema screens at foreign festivals and retrospectives. In such cases, I have listed the titles. I have also listed amateur films made on 8mm and 16mm formats, generally for private screenings; although, in many cases, these films are not readily available, they have been important in forming the style of many directors since the seventies, and thus merit inclusion.

      The other conscious exclusion, perhaps more controversial, is anime. Without disputing the vitality and commercial success of Japanese animated film, I would argue that the distinction between animated and live-action cinema is roughly analogous to that between painting and photography; essentially, the two are different media, and merit separate books. This is particularly the case where direction is concerned, since the role of a director in recording a series of drawings is qualitatively different from that of a director working with live actors in real settings. This exclusion does not convey any relative valuation of the two, merely a recognition of their essential difference. There are, of course, a few filmmakers who have worked in both live-action and animated film; these artists are included if the quality of their work in live-action alone justifies it.

      It is more difficult to offer a coherent set of criteria for inclusion. I have based my decisions on my sense of each director’s importance in Japanese cinema, and to an extent on my own evaluation of their talent. I have not excluded directors simply because I dislike their work; if they are generally considered significant, they are here. However, I have made space for little-known directors who do not command a wide reputation if I am personally enthusiastic about their work. Other things being equal, I have been more inclined to include directors whose work is accessible in some form to non-Japanese-speaking viewers, whether available on DVD or video, or in distribution in subtitled prints, or where subtitled copies are not in general distribution but are available for festival or retrospective screenings. This does not always mean that the work of the directors I have covered is readily available; subtitled prints may exist in archives, but emerge infrequently in the context of touring retrospectives which visit only major cities. This frustrating situation is a familiar misery for lovers of the Japanese cinema. At the time of writing, however, things are definitely improving. Hitherto inaccessible films by Naruse and Yamanaka have been released on DVD in Britain and the United States; it is becoming more common for releases in Japan to carry the option of English subtitles; and a wide range of subtitled films is now available in Hong Kong and accessible via specialist importers. There are still many gaps; but today’s reader is perhaps in a better position to test my judgments than ever before.

      To examine and discuss so many Japanese filmmakers, even briefly, is an enormous task. In the course of my research I have watched over a thousand films, and I have tried wherever possible to see a representative sample of the work of each director under consideration. However, there have inevitably been occasions where important films have proved elusive, or, indeed, where they are believed to be lost. Thus, my descriptions are based on a mixture of first-hand experience and secondary reading. Lest there be any misunderstanding, the mere mention of a film in the text, a summary of its plot, or a description of its subject matter and concerns should not be taken as proof that I have seen it. Of course, where I have advanced an opinion on a film, or given a detailed description of its tone or stylistic features, this is based on my own viewing.

      This book is intended as a source of both factual information and critical discussion. I have endeavored to make the facts as accurate as possible. Critical opinions, of course, are always a matter for debate. I hope that this book will lead its readers back to the films, so that they can form their own.

      A Note on Translation

      The Japanese writing system is arguably the most complex in the world, and transliterating it into Roman letters is itself a difficult task, while producing readable translations is even more so. Since the same character can have multiple readings, and the correct reading is not always clear from the context, even Japanese readers sometimes stumble. In order to establish the correct readings I have worked with two native speakers, Maiko Miyoshi and Etsuko Takagi, to transliterate titles from original Japanese sources, and wherever possible have tried to confirm our readings by consulting sources which give a phonetic reading, whether in Japanese kana or in Roman script. The sources I have consulted are listed in the Bibliography. However, I have avoided relying wholly on previously published filmographies, as mistakes have sometimes been made by one writer and then perpetuated. Also, most published filmographies in Roman script do not indicate the lengths of most vowels. Because of this, I have transliterated wherever possible from scratch, and then compared my readings with other published sources.

      I have transliterated according to the Revised Hepburn system, which is the most widely used system of Romanization. Thus, in native Japanese or Chinese-derived words, long vowels ‘a’, ‘o’ and ‘u’ are indicated by a macron, long ‘i’ by ‘ii’, and long ‘e’ by ‘ei’ (as in ‘geisha’). In words taken from foreign languages other than Chinese, and thus written in Japanese in katakana, I have followed the convention of using macrons to lengthen all vowels (so Yoshimitsu Morita’s Family Game is “Kazoku gēmu,” not “Kazoku geimu”). I have made an exception for a few titles where the original katakana depart from this convention. Syllabic ‘n’ is always represented as ‘n’; thus, I depart from some previous scholars of the Japanese cinema in referring to swordplay films as chanbara rather than chambara. Where a vowel or ‘y’ follows a syllabic ‘n’, I use an apostrophe to avoid confusion; thus, the author of The Makioka Sisters