KINEJAPAN digest 3066

[mjraine at uchicago.edu]

>1) Shojiro comes back from China wearing a sort of uniform without insignia. It 
>seems to be a kind of suit cut in a military style for civilian wear. It seems to me 
>that I saw some people wearing this sort of outfit, for lack of anything else left 
>to wear, in the year or two after the war ended, and I think they may have been 
>gray, or maybe some shade of khaki.
>
>When Shojiro comes back to Japan from Tianjin, all other male characters are 
>still wearing regular Western suits. Only he seems to be wearing this outfit. 
>Would this have indicated to 1941 Tokyo audiences that he had some sort of 
>Japanese military or civil govt. job in Occupied Tianjin?
>

Isn't this "kokuminfuku"? It was promoted by the army from 1940 as part of the rationalization of civilian life. Yoshimura Hideo in Shochiku Ofuna eiga thinks it's part of Ozu's compromise with the 1939 Film Law. According to google, Hasumi Shigehiko writes something about this in his recent "zuiso". 

Apparently there were several varieties of Kokuminfuku: I remember Shojiro wearing the buttoned-up collar version that was apparently worn by bureaucrats, so maybe audiences would make that connection. At the very least, the contrast with the decadent bourgeois in their western suits is clear. 

Michael