Cineastes review/essay: Ugetsu

Although he had been making films since the early 1920's, it wasn't until a trio of award winning films at the Venice film festival that Kenji Mizoguchi found an audience in the west. Riding a wave of eastern film-makers including other Japanese classicists; Mikio Naruse, Jasujiro Ozu and Akira Kurosawa. He had developed his style in the 1930's, mastering a sequence shooting approach to his films, utilizing a one shot one scene approach which gave his work a unique fluidity. He was always different in style to the great master Ozu who's stately, static and sitting camera (his camera rarely came above the level of the human sternum, keeping in the Japanese tradition of sitting) was at odds with Mizoguchi's which was constantly moving tracking his actors.
In Ugetsu monogatari (Ugetsu) (1953) we find Mizoguchi entering his mature period, fresh from winning the international prize at Venice in 1952 with Saikaku ichidai onna (The Life of Oharu) Mizoguchi was hitting a whole new stride that would produce arguably his best work,concerned with a frank examination of post-war Japan and as ever a examination into the lives of Japan's women. These later works also showed a distinct change in style, blending his sequence shooting with a Hollywood influence; the adoption of constant mid-shots and tracking camera to his work, cutting only into a close up or away to other other angles for effect. This is noticeable throughout Ugetsu, particularly in the opening scenes when we learn of Genjoro's big plans to sell his pottery in the big town across lake Biwa and of the impending invasion of the soldiers. However Ugetsu does not pander to the strict rules of Hollywood in any way, it is very much of its self, unfolding in a patient manner, with subtle and touching performances from the entire cast, especially Masayuki Mori and Kinvyo Tanaka, playing the central doomed husband and wife Genjoro and Miyagi. Two of Japan's most famous actors at the time, here they prove more than there worth giving restrained but emotionally aware performances.
Set in 16th Century Japan Mizoguchi presents to us a humble ghost story, adapted from three notable texts that were very popular in Japan; Akinari Ueda's “The house in the thicket”, “the serpent's lust” (both from the collection of stories “Ugetsu Monogatari” literally: tales of moonlight and rain.) and “How he got the legion of honer” by French writer Guy de Maupassant. Mizoguchi's choice for literary adaptation as opposed to a completely original screenplay gives the film a timeless sense, these a regarded a classics in Japan, the film is evocative of both past and present, with its themes just as relevant now as they were in a war torn 16th century Japan.
The film is broad in its thematic scope, offering us a harsh portrayal of family and consequence in wartime, a meditation on the power of love to draw oneself into their rightful and dutiful place (most evident in the seemingly unrealistic strand of Tobei becoming a (forged) success, then giving it all up to return to his wife, something that Mizoguchi was not intent on being in the final film but that was added at producer Masaichi Nagata's insistence. To Mizoguchi the draw of power was too strong for man.) and the power of subjective fantasy and fallacy. The theme of war and its effects on simple family life is the most potent in the film, and the most universal, applying itself to the film's setting, the historical context of the films production and even today as we witness the fall out from the Iraq war coming to a close.
Much of the films overbearing power and skilful articulation of the themes mentioned above, is down to the genius of Mizoguchi, he has crafted the film in such a way to make them come to fore and present to us an unforgettable piece of film-making. Genjoro and Tobei both love and want the best for their families this is obvious form the outset, but Genjoro wants more, he wants to be elevated out this simple poverty stricken life, his wife however is content with her family just being together and safe during this turbulent time. Genjoro ignores her wants for wants for a quiet existence, and along with his neighbour Tobei sees a chance to profiteer from the civil war by selling his pottery in the large market town across the lake. Tobei joins him with his wife Ohama, but Genjoro insists that Miyagi stays somewhere safe and looks after their son. With what follows Mizoguchi orchestrates a severe distancing of the men and women; men going off into their subjective fantasy worlds while the women suffer at the hands of imperial soldiers.
This is a Very common trait in Mizoguchi's film, to show the plight of women, he has been called a feminist film-maker, with his melodramas from the late 1940's focusing particularly on strong female characters. Their subjection here to rape, murder and a life of prostitution is devastating, shot in a cold, unadorned way we are shown Ohama's rape and Miyagi's murder, form the perspective of stark realism, spying on them from a distance making the action all the more poignant, completely detached from the flattering and tranquil world in which Genjoro's fantasy is shot. Another element which infuses the film with its power is Mizoguchi's relentless commitment to period detail showing a very realistic world, making the characters and their actions all the more plausible. Perhaps Mizoguchi's most potent device is his use of self-reflexive or “echo” scenes; the most effective being of Genjoro's pottery wheel, which we see him and Miyagi both working hard on together at the films beginnings, but at the end we are shown Genjoro alone his wife now dead, (a victim of man's insatiable greed?) he works hard to support his son, we here Miyagi on the soundtrack telling her husband how he has become the man she has always wanted.
There has been much written about Mizoguchi as a film-maker and indeed about this film, which many cite as his masterpiece, but I think the most appropriate words to describe it come form the film itself, as Lady Wakasa describes Genjoro's pottery: “The fruit of experience is beauty, but only a master craftsman can create such beauty.” A film of true timeless beauty indeed, from a master at the height of his craft.