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<P style="MARGIN: 0cm 0cm 6pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'">Dear Kinejapaners,<?xml:namespace
prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office"
/><o:p></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0cm 0cm 6pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'">I wonder if some of you could help me
understand a few things about Naruse's 1941 film, <I
style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">Hideko<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>no sashō-san</I> .<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Actually,
the reason I had ferreted out a copy of this film was something I came across in
<I style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">Asia</I> magazine ('the journal of the
American Asiatic Society') for August 1940 by Stafford Cripps (p399-401). [He
was a Labour ex-minister, would soon be appointed by Churchill as ambassador to
Moscow and was later Chancellor of the Exchequer.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>He had just visited China and Japan]
:-<o:p></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P
style="MARGIN: 12pt 0cm 0pt; LAYOUT-GRID-MODE: char; mso-layout-grid-align: none"
class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN-US"
lang=EN-US>"The lack of gasoline supplies was obvious in the buses converted to
use water-gas and the almost complete absence of private cars on the
streets.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>While I was in Tokyo a
committee of the Diet was discussing the breakdown of rural bus transport and
the appropriate Minister solemnly explained to them that this was really a
blessing in disguise, since the Japanese were tending to become lazy and it
would do them good to walk instead of travelling in buses
!"<o:p></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P
style="MARGIN: 6pt 0cm 0pt; LAYOUT-GRID-MODE: char; mso-layout-grid-align: none"
class=MsoNormal><SPAN style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'">It made me
wonder whether the Takamine/ Naruse film, made immediately after this, was quite
the innocent rural idyll that I had read about.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It certainly didn't matter for my
Takamine obit. for <I style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">The Independent</I>,
which was long filed - it appeared this week, tinkered, and all eleven words
about her war-time filmography were cut. <A
href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/hideko-takamine-japanese-actress-whose-film-career-spanned-half-a-century-2221668.html"><FONT
color=#800080>http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/hideko-takamine-japanese-actress-whose-film-career-spanned-half-a-century-2221668.html</FONT></A>
<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>So this is just for anyone who's
interested.<o:p></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P
style="MARGIN: 6pt 0cm 0pt; LAYOUT-GRID-MODE: char; mso-layout-grid-align: none"
class=MsoNormal><SPAN style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'">In this deeply
rural location, there's a shortage of passengers but not of fuel.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Neither bus that we see, has been
converted, and one bus overtakes its rival to get to the customers first.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>No-one, except the industrious Deko-chan
has to walk anywhere.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>But is this
supposed to be in the now?<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Unless Cripps and the Transport Minister
made it all up, isn't this referring to a 'then'?<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I think the script carefully hedges its
bets here - although if anyone could unpack this sentence of Audie Bock (undated
Film Center 'Naruse' Catalog), I'd appreciate it: "The story is of course
largely autobiographical on the part of Ibuse" [Ibuse Masuji].<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I presume she means the part of the
writer, Ikawa, in the story.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>But
had Ibuse already published this story ?<o:p></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P
style="MARGIN: 6pt 0cm 0pt; LAYOUT-GRID-MODE: char; mso-layout-grid-align: none"
class=MsoNormal><SPAN style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'">Catherine
Russell is helpful and insightful as ever, particularly about Takamine's persona
in the closing shots.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>But Catherine
reads the film's end, as others do, as "Okoma and Sonoda have triumphed over
their indolent, corrupt boss to save the company".<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I thought - but the disc I obtained is
<U>terrible</U>, so I would be happy to be corrected - that we had just
previously cut back to the office and learnt that the boss had sold the bus,
sacked the staff and was closing the office tomorrow.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>We could hope that the new owner might
judge that Deko-chan had more mileage in her than that bone-shaker of a bus and
include her in the deal, but we shouldn't count on it.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Which would make the pure optimism of
the closing shot not only poignant<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>but religious, a point that Catherine observes about these wartime films
a little earlier.<o:p></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P
style="MARGIN: 6pt 0cm 0pt; LAYOUT-GRID-MODE: char; mso-layout-grid-align: none"
class=MsoNormal><SPAN style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'">And my final
question - In the scene just before this, Deko-chan is teasing her
driver-colleague, that the departed writer, Ikawa, had likened him to a 'ninjin'
in a French film.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>One could argue
that reference to a French film in late 1941 was also referring back to a
previous period.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>But what French
film is this with a carrot - oriental or occidental ?<o:p></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P
style="MARGIN: 6pt 0cm 0pt; LAYOUT-GRID-MODE: char; mso-layout-grid-align: none"
class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'"><o:p> </o:p></SPAN></P>
<P
style="MARGIN: 6pt 0cm 0pt; LAYOUT-GRID-MODE: char; mso-layout-grid-align: none"
class=MsoNormal><SPAN style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'">Any suggestions
or corrections appreciated,<o:p></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P
style="MARGIN: 6pt 0cm 0pt; LAYOUT-GRID-MODE: char; mso-layout-grid-align: none"
class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'">Roger<o:p></o:p></SPAN></P></DIV></BODY></HTML>