'Tendency films'

[Roger Macy]

Dear Kinejapaners,
Could someone clarify a point for me on the term 'tendency films' (keiko eiga).  In a piece by Ian Buruma in the Guardian of 9th January, and now getting reproduced elsewhere, he says: "The so-called "tendency film", favoured by some leftist directors in the 1950s, attacking the class system or capitalism or the American military presence, was of no interest to [Ozu] ...".
I had always thought that the term 'keiko eiga' had been specific to the period around 1930, and that comparable films of the 50s were more likely to be called 'social films, or 'shakai mono'; although I accept that the term 'tendenz-literatur' has a longer continuum going back at least to Engels.
Although one can hardly dispute that Ozu steered a path distinct from any such movement, can one use 'tendency films' to describe films of the 50s ?
Roger
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