Like many filmmakers of the pioneering generation – John Ford or Raoul Walsh, for example – he stumbled into the nascent film industry more or less by accident and learned his craft on the job. He’d been denied a secondary education by his hated father, a carpenter who had bankrupted the family through an ill-judged venture to supply the troops during the Russo-Japanese War, and so he read voraciously – including some Western fiction in translation – and took a course in painting and a job in lay-out design. In his adolescence he was greatly supported by his elder sister Suzu, who’d been sold as a geisha by their father but who married a viscount; the motif of a woman sacrificing her own happiness to help an impoverished man recurs throughout Mizoguchi’s work. Through a musician friend he met directors and actors at Nikkatsu film studios and was taken on by the company as a very menial production assistant in 1920, aged 22.

The film industry in the 1920s was a young man’s world. Films were silent and made very quickly; formulas were strong but not entrenched. Directing up to nine films a year in the social and economic chaos that followed the devastating Kanto earthquake of 1923, Mizoguchi made everything from tragic melodramas to an anti-Chinese satire, from an Arsène Lupin mystery to an experiment with expressionism. He also made several “proletarian” dramas, probably less from deep Marxist convictions than from his constant need to challenge authority figures. By the end of the decade, though, he was turning his back on modernist styles and gravitating towards historical dramas, often inflected with the spirit of romantic tragedy found in stage melodramas of the time. Angry social protest resurfaced in his work in the mid-1930s and the years after WWII, but as he settled into middle age he concentrated more on film aesthetics and was driven by a search for “perfection.” In his final years he alternated elegiac historical dramas and films about the moral and emotional problems of women set in the present day.

On our way to what Mizoguchi meant by perfection, let’s examine some of the key tenets of his reputation. These are the clichés that come up time and again when the director is discussed: his “feminism,” his tyrannical behaviour on set, and his dedication to long takes and sequence shots.

Was Mizoguchi a feminist? Most Japanese critics would say he was, because the Japanese concept of feminism is in essence a concern for the sufferings of women rather than an assertion of female/male equality or a struggle for women’s rights. Mizoguchi was robustly heterosexual and he took a non-moralistic view (usual in Japan) of prostitution. His own relationships with women were never straightforward. An incident in 1925 brought him notoriety in the newspapers: he was cohabiting with a prostitute who one evening furiously attacked him with a cut-throat razor. He was left with life-long scars across his back, but the episode didn’t stop him from pursuing the woman and trying to resume their liaison, which ended only when he married a dance-hall girl in 1926. Some fifteen years later there was more scandal-sheet gossip about Mizoguchi’s infatuation with his favourite actress Tanaka Kinuyo, but in his capacity as chair of the Directors’ Guild it was Mizoguchi who tried to prevent Tanaka from becoming a director in her own right.

The off-screen contradictions in Mizoguchi’s life suggest that his feminism was as unstable and compromised as his earlier leftism. But it’s a fact that much of his work is imbued with a piercing empathy with victimised and exploited women, and that at least five of his films – Osaka Elegy and Sisters of the Gion (both 1936), Victory of Women (1946), Women of the Night (1948) and My Love Has Been Burning (1949) – go way beyond empathy to far more militant attacks on the oppression of women. The two 1936 films secured Mizoguchi’s critical reputation in Japan; if they’d been seen in the West at the time, they might well have short-circuited much Western thinking about women’s issues.

Was Mizoguchi a tyrant on set? There are countless anecdotes about his intransigence in matters of performance and set-decoration, and plenty of actors have testified to the hard times they endured during his shoots. I suspect that some of his reported behaviour was related to a lingering personal insecurity about his lack of higher education: after a rivalry with the highly intellectual Murata Minoru in the early 1920s, Mizoguchi was intent on establishing himself as at least the equal of better-educated contemporaries. But he was also modelling himself on one his heroes, the Hollywood director Josef von Sternberg, often noted as the most demanding talent at Paramount. Mizoguchi spoke of his admiration for Sternberg’s Morocco (1930) in particular, and was delighted to meet the director during his visit to Japan in 1936.

And was Mizoguchi’s style defined by long takes and sequence shots? As someone who learned the grammar of silent film, he knew the value of close-ups and of montage. But in the talkie era he came to feel that his actors – and the emotional pull of the film as a whole – could be better served by avoiding editing whenever possible. From the mid-1930s onwards the average shot in his films became noticeably longer and he began experimenting with shooting entire scenes without a cut. This new aesthetic approach peaked in his 1939 film Tale of the Late Chrysanthemums, where his mise en scène is strikingly different from other Japanese films of the time (although that film includes three scenes on the kabuki theatre stage which are shot and edited very differently). But this was never an approach that he pursued as doggedly as, say, Jancsó later did in Hungary. The later films integrate long takes and occasional sequence shots into a mise en scène which is skilfully balanced between the needs of the actors and the imperatives of storytelling.

Some of Mizoguchi’s best films are set in the Meiji era (1868-1912), which saw not only the restoration of imperial rule but also the opening-up of Japan to the outside world, and his perfectionism was often a matter of recreating that time with scrupulous accuracy. But his greatest insights were into the vagaries of human relationships – whether romantic, economic or constrained by gender and class. As much as any other great director, and more than most, he remains a filmmaker who put the full resources of his medium to use to lay bare human truths.

Tony Rayns

FILMOGRAPHY

Ai ni yomigaeru hi / Ai ni jomigaeru hi / The Resurrection of Love, 1922

Kantô / Kantó / Kanto, 1923 (short documentary)

Kokyô (Furusato) / Kokjó (Furusato) / Home Town, 1923

Seishun no yumeji / Seišun no jumedži / Dreams of Youth, 1923

Jôen no chimata / Džóen no čimata / City of Desire, 1923

Haizan no uta wa kanashi / Haizan no uta wa kanaši / Failure’s Song Is Sad, 1923

Hachi ichi san (Rupimono) / Hači iči san / The Adventures of Arsène Lupin, 1923

Kiri no minato / Kiri no minato / Foggy Harbour, 1923

Haikyo no naka / Haikjo no naka / Among the Ruins, 1923

Yorû / Jorú / The Night, 1923

Chî to reî / Čí to reí / Blood and Soul, 1923

Toge no uta / Toge no uta / The Song of the Mountain Pass, 1923

Kanashiki hakuchi / Kanašiki hakuči / The Sad Idiot, 1924

Akatsuki no shi / Akacuki no ši / Death at Dawn, 1924

Gendai no joô / Gendai no džoó / The Queen of Modern Times, 1924

Josei wa tsuyoshi / Džosei wa cujoši / Women Are Strong, 1924

Jinkyô / Džinkjó / This Dusty World / Tenhle ubohý svět, 1924

Shichimenchô no yukue / Šičimenčó no jukue / Turkeys in a Row, 1924

Samidare sôshi / Samidare sóši / A Chronicle of May Rain, 1924

Koi o tatsu ono / Koi o tacu ono / The Axe That Severed Love, 1924 (co-dir. Kiyomatsu Hosoyama)

Kanraku no onna / Kanraku no onna / A Woman of Pleasure, 1924

Kyokubadan no joô / Kjokubadan no džoó / Queen of the Circus, 1924

Itô junsa no shi / Itó džunsa no ši / The Death of Officer Ito, 1924 (co-dir. Kensaku Suzuki, Iyokichi Konda)

 tokumukan Kantô / Á tokumukan Kantó / Oh, the Special Duty Boat Kanto, 1925 (co-dir. Wakayama Osuma, Kensaku Suzuki)

Musen fusen / Musen fusen / No Money, No Fight, 1925

Gakuso o idete / Gakuso o idete / Out of College, 1925

Daichi wa hohoemu / Daiči wa hohoemu / The Earth Smiles, 1925

Shirayuri wa nageku / Širajuri wa nageku / The White Lily Laments, 1925

Akai yûhi ni terasarete / Akai júhi ni terasarete / Shining in the Red Sunset, 1925

Gaijô no sukechi / Gaidžó no sukeči / Street Scenes, 1925

Ningen / Ningen / The Human Being, 1925

Furusato no uta / Furusato no uta / The Song of Home, 1925

Nogi taishô to Kuma-san (Nogi shôgun to Kuma-san) / General Nogi and Kuma-san, 1925

Dôka-ô / Dóka-ó / The Copper Coin King, 1926 (medium-length)

Kami-ningyô haru no sasayaki / Kami-ningjó haru no sasajaki / A Paper Doll’s Whisper of Spring, 1926

Shin ono ga tsumi / Šin ono ga cumi / My Fault, new version, 1926

Kyôren no onna shishô / Kjóren no onna šišó / The Passion of a Woman Teacher, 1926

Kaikoku danji / Kaikoku dandži / The Boy of the Sea, 1926

Kane / Kane / Money, 1926

Kô-on / Kó-on / The Imperial Grace, 1927

Jihi shinchô / Džihi šinčó / The Cuckoo, 1927 (short)

Hito no isshô / Hito no isšó / A Man’s Life, 1928

Musume kawaiya / Musume kawaija / My Lovely Daughter, 1928

Nihonbashi / Nihonbaši / The Nihon Bridge, 1929

Asahi wa kagayaku / Asahi wa kagajaku / The Morning Sun Shines, 1929 (short)

Tôkyô kôshinkyoku / Tókjó kóšinkjoku / Tokyo March, 1929

Tokai kôkyôgaku / Tokai kókjógaku / Metropolitan Symphony, 1929

Furusato / Furusato / Home Town, 1930

Tôjin Okichi / Tódžin Okiči / Mistress of a Foreigner, 1930

Shikamo karera wa yuku / Šikamo karera wa juku / And Yet They Go, 1931

Toki no ujigami / Toki no udžigami / The Man of the Moment, 1932

Manmô kenkoku no reimei / Manmó kenkoku no reimei / The Dawn of Manchukuo and Mongolia, 1932

Taki no Shiraito / Taki no Širaito / Taki no Shiraito, the Water Magician, 1933

Gion matsuri / Gion macuri / Gion Festival, 1933

Jinpû-ren / Džinpú-ren / The Jinpu Group, 1933

Aizô tôge / Aizó tóge / The Mountain Pass of Love and Hate, 1934

Orizuru Osen / Orizuru Osen / The Downfall of Osen, 1934

Maria no Oyuki / Maria no Ojuki / Oyuki the Madonna, 1935

Gubijinsô / Gubidžinsó / Poppy, 1935

Naniwa erejî / Naniwa eredží / Osaka Elegy, 1936

Gion no shimai / Gion no šimai / Sisters of the Gion, 1936

Aien kyô / Aien kjó / The Straits of Love and Hate, 1937

Roei no uta / Roei no uta / The Song of the Camp, 1938

Aa kokyô (Aa furusato) / Aa kokjó (Aa furusato) / Ah, My Home Town, 1938

Zangiku monogatari / Zangiku monogatari / The Tale of the Late Chrysanthemums, 1939

Naniwa onna / Naniwa onna / The Woman of Osaka, 1940

Geidô ichidai otoko / Geidó ičidai otoko / The Life of an Actor, 1940

Genroku chûshingura I-II / Genroku Čúšingura I-II / The Loyal 47 Ronin I-II, 1942

Danjûrô sandai / Dandžúró sandai / Three Generations of Danjuro, 1944

Miyamoto Musashi / Mijamoto Musaši / Musashi Miyamoto, 1944

Meitô bijomaru / Meitó bidžomaru / The Famous Sword Bijomaru, 1945

Hisshôka / Hisšóka / Victory Song, 1945 (co-dir. Masahirô Makino, Hiroshi Shimizu, Tomotaka Tasaka)

Josei no shôri / Džosei no šóri / Victory of Women, 1946

Utamaro o meguru gonin no onna / Utamaro o meguru gonin no onna / Utamaro and His Five Women, 1946

Joyû Sumako no koi / Džojú Sumako no koi / The Love of Sumako the Actress, 1947

Yoru no onnatachi / Joru no onnatači / Women of the Night, 1948

Waga koi wa moenu / Waga koi wa moenu / My Love Has Been Burning, 1949

Yuki fujin ezu / Juki fudžin ezu / Portrait of Madame Yuki, 1950

Oyû-sama / Ojú-sama / Miss Oyu, 1951

Musashino fujin / Musašino fudžin / The Lady of Musashino, 1951

Saikaku ichidai onna / Saikaku ičidai onna / The Life of Oharu, 1952

Ugetsu monogatari / Ugecu monogatari / Tales of the Moon and the Rain, 1953

Gion bayashi / Gion bajaši / Gion Festival Music, 1953

Sanshô dayû / Sanšó dajú / Sansho, the Bailiff, 1954

Uwasa no onna / Uwasa no onna / The Woman of the Rumor, 1954

Chikamatsu monogatari / Čikamacu monogatari / A Story from Chikamatsu, 1954

Yôkihi / Jókihi / Empress Yank Kwei Fei, 1955

Shin Heike monogatari / Šin Heike monogatari / New Tales of the Taira Clan, 1955

Akasen chitai / Akasen čitai / Street of Shame, 1956