Archive of films Cheerful Girl / Aozora musume
Japan
1957, 89 min
Section:
Tribute to Yasuzô Masumura
Year: 2023
Synopsis
Masumura’s sophomore feature marks his first collaboration with iconic star Ayako Wakao – a legendary partnership that would spawn twenty of the pair’s best films. Wakao plays Yûko, a willful 18-year-old high school student who leaves her small village in search of her estranged cleaning lady mother and her businessman father, who never acknowledged her. As Yûko ventures to find her place in her father’s dysfunctional household, A Cheerful Girl swiftly switches gears from a Sirkian melodrama to a blithe deconstruction of the post-war nuclear family, charged with irony, mischievousness, and utter irreverence for the venerated Japanese family drama. Filmed in gorgeously earthy pastel colors, A Cheerful Girl is one of the most atypical coming-of-age Asian pictures of the 1950s.
Joseph Fahim
Contacts
Kadokawa Corporation
2-13-12 Fujimi, Chiyoda-ku, 102-8552, Tokyo
Japan
Tel: +81 807 233 6972
E-mail: [email protected]
About the film
Color, DCP
Section: | Tribute to Yasuzô Masumura |
---|---|
Director: | Yasuzô Masumura |
Screenplay: | Yoshio Shirasaka |
Dir. of Photography: | Michio Takahashi |
Music: | Taichiro Kosugi |
Sound: | Takeo Suda |
Editor: | Tatsuji Nakasizu |
Art Director: | Tokuji Shibata |
Producer: | Masaichi Nagata |
Production: | DAIEI studio, Kadokawa Corporation |
Cast: | Ayako Wakao, Kenji Sugawara, Keizo Kawasaki |
Sales: | Kadokawa Corporation |