Sento (was Kawase)

[Mark Schilling]

Aaron,

Thanks for correction. Again, the Q & A interview was a rough edit and will
not appear in print. In the story I wrote for "Winds" I used the English
title "Embracing."

Also, as mentioned in my note that prefaced the interview, I edited my
questions to the bare minimum. The "MTV influence" and "style versus
substance" comments were not intended as nuanced arguments, but simply as
broad strokes to provoke a response from Sento. The question I wanted to
ask her was simply: given the distinctly different stylistic tendencies
among young directors, where do you stand? In my article on young directors
for the Japan Quarterly I state my views on the stylistic divide with what
I hope is more precision.

I don't know whether Iwai or Aoyama have spent much time watching MTV -- it
doesn't really matter. What I do know is that an MTV generation exists
(though the term itself has become a cliche) and Iwai and Aoyama, as much
as any other young directors, seem to belong to it. By "MTV generation" I
mean young people -- set your own age boundary -- who have grown up in a
media-saturated culture and feel more comfortable dealing with images than
words, who are more used to taking the floods of information they process
constantly in quick bites than long takes, who have little regard for
traditional film logic and hierarchies. Whatever you may think of the
relative merits of Iwai and Aoyama as directors, they both express the
sensibility of that generation in their work. 

"Style over substance" is, admittedly, a put down. But if you read my JT
reviews and my comments in the "Japan Quarterly" you'll see that I find a
progression in Aoyama's work. The "style over substance" comment is more
applicable, in my view, to "Helpless" than "Wild Life," which I named as
one of my ten best films of 1997.

Finally, while I certainly don't think it hurts young directors to see a
lot of movies and read deeply in film history and theory, I believe that
many of them could benefit from more life experience before they step
behind the camera. Would we have had "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre" if
John Huston had spend his youth in classrooms and film libraries instead of
the Mexican cavalry? Probably not. 

Anyway, thanks for your comments. I would like to meet Aoyama and hear what
he thinks!   

Mark Schilling (schill at gol.com)