Tribute to Kenji Mizoguchi 2017 / Orizuru Osen / Japan 1934
A maid named Osen prostitutes herself to support messenger Sokichi’s education. In later life he’s a prosperous doctor who has forgotten his benefactor, until one night on a rain-swept station platform… This deeply poignant love-tragedy has the richly expressive visuals of a late silent movie and a daringly convoluted flashback structure.
A deeply poignant love-tragedy about two ex-employees of a crooked art dealer: the maid Osen prostitutes herself to support the education of the messenger Sokichi. In later life he’s a prosperous doctor who has forgotten his benefactor, until one night on a rain-swept station platform … Shot silent but released with music and narration, this has the richly expressive visuals of a late silent movie and a daringly convoluted flashback structure. The flashbacks are steeped in the atmosphere of the Meiji era, drawing as much from Mizoguchi’s childhood memories as from the novel by the great Izumi Kyoka, capturing a period that was remote from the audience by 1934. The seminal Mizoguchi theme of a woman sacrificing her own happiness for the man she loves is brought alive by the incandescent Yamada Isuzu (also the star of Osaka Elegy – and later the Lady Macbeth figure in Kurosawa’s Throne of Blood).
Tony Rayns
78 min / Black & white, 35 mm
Director Kenji Mizoguchi
/ Screenplay Tasunosuke Takashima podle románu / based on the novel Baishoku Kamo Nanban by Kyoka Izumi
/ Dir. of Photography Minoru Miki
/ Music Akitada Matsui
/ Art Director Yoshiji Oguri
/ Producer Masaichi Nagata
/ Production Dai-ichi Eiga
/ Cast Isuzu Yamada, Daijiro Natsukawa, Genichi Fujii, Shin Shibata, Mitsusaburo Ramon
/ Sales Shochiku Co., Ltd.
/ Contact National Film Center
Shochiku Co., Ltd.
4-1-1 Tsukiji, Togeki Bldg. 12th Floor, Chuo-Ku, 104 8422, Tokyo
Japan
Phone: +81 355 501 623
Fax: +81 355 501 654
E-mail: [email protected]
National Film Center
3-7-6, Kyobashi, Chuo-ku, 104-0031, Tokyo
Japan
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