<html><head></head><body><div style="font-family:Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;font-size:16px;"><p class="ydp44d639c4MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial">Dear KineJapaners,</span></p>
<p class="ydp44d639c4MsoNormal" style="margin-top:6.0pt;layout-grid-mode:char;mso-layout-grid-align:none"><i><span style="font-family:Arial">Engeiji ringu</span></i><span style="font-family:Arial">’s source and aftermath</span></p>
<p class="ydp44d639c4MsoNormal" style="margin-top:6.0pt;layout-grid-mode:char;mso-layout-grid-align:none"><i><span style="font-family:Arial">Engeiji ringu</span></i><span style="font-family:Arial">, written and directed by Kinoshita Keisuke, 1950,
got a pair of screenings as part of the BFI’s current 50s season, ‘Rears and
Laughter, Women in Japanese Melodrama’ (which runs through November and I don’t
think has been mentioned here).</span></p>
<p class="ydp44d639c4MsoNormal" style="margin-top:6.0pt;layout-grid-mode:char;mso-layout-grid-align:none"><span style="font-family:Arial">I was recounting the film to a Chinese friend
and he remarked on the similarity with <i>Spring in a Small Town</i>,
1949.<span> </span>There are differences of course. For
example, <i>Spring in a Small Town</i> has a quadrangular complication; but
they have enough similarities to have intrigued me.</span></p>
<p class="ydp44d639c4MsoNormal" style="margin-top:6.0pt;layout-grid-mode:char;mso-layout-grid-align:none"><span style="font-family:Arial">The very little that I have found in
Marianne Lewinsky’s book (Mariann seems to have had an ‘e’ when she wrote in
French), and the rather more that Mats Karlsson has kindly dug up in the books
of Satō Tadao and Osabe Hideo all point to couple of sentences that Kinoshita
wrote defensively after a critical drubbing (he was proud that the only writer
in support was Mishima Yukio). I have not read the original criticism but
Kinoshita points to a furore over a scene where Tanaka reacts to the smell of
Mifune’s vest. Apparently ignoring that the stock-in-trade of much film was
desire, the portrayal of such desire by a respectable mature woman was
‘pornographic’. <span> </span>Kinoshita then seems to
write of his <i><span style="color:black">Karumen kokyō ni kaeru </span></i><span style="color:black">as a pushback. For there to be enough objection for
Kinoshita to be wounded seems barely credible for such a fleeting scene and
seems to me to be deflected criticism of Tanaka. This was the first released
film after her controversial return from the </span></span><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black">U.S.</span><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black"></span></p>
<p class="ydp44d639c4MsoNormal" style="margin-top:6.0pt;layout-grid-mode:char;mso-layout-grid-align:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black">All of that seems to eclipse
any discussion of the origin or inspiration of the story in the literature. I
can find no reference in ‘Allcinema’ to the original <i>Spring in a Small Town</i>
being shown in </span><span style="font-family: Arial;color:black">Japan</span><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black"> at all. </span><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black">Shanghai</span><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black"> was close enough to </span><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black">Japan</span><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black">, but I know nothing of any traffic in
the closing months of the Nationalist presence on the Chinese mainland,
although people and reports must have crossed. To feed my inner
conspiracy-theorist, I note that, by the time <i>Engeiji ringu</i> was
released, the Korean War had broken out and mention of a Chinese inspiration
would have been fraught.</span></p>
<p class="ydp44d639c4MsoNormal" style="margin-top:6.0pt;layout-grid-mode:char;mso-layout-grid-align:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black">Indeed, I can think of no
influence of home-grown Chinese film on Japanese cinema in the first three
quartiles of the twentieth century which, if a valid observation, is some
absence (‘Home-grown’ is there to exclude occupation-era productions by
Japanese film companies - I don’t even know of any export to Japan from the </span><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black">Shanghai</span><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black"> studio run by Kawakita. And there were,
later, a few famous </span><span style="font-family:Arial; color:black">Hong Kong</span><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black"> co-productions).<span> </span>I grant
that there could be a Chinese film nesting in the index of Yamamoto’s book on
the ‘Influence of Foreign Films’, but I can’t spot any.</span></p>
<div class="ydp44d639c4MsoNormal" style="margin-top:6.0pt;layout-grid-mode:char;mso-layout-grid-align:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black">So I would be grateful for
any enlightenment on an influence from mainland Chinese film content upon </span><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black">Japan</span><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black"> in this period or, indeed, alternative
thoughts on inspiration for <i>Engeiji ringu</i>.</span></div><div class="ydp44d639c4MsoNormal" style="margin-top:6.0pt;layout-grid-mode:char;mso-layout-grid-align:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black">Roger<br></span><span style="font-family:Arial"></span></div>
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