[KineJapan] Hara Setsuko

Tue Dec 1 07:41:11 EST 2015

Dear KineJapaners,The obituaries for Hara Setsuko in the English newspapers are now all published.  Mostly they are not in great depth, were not written by Japanese specialists and do not situate her fame in Japan at all.
However, there is one honourable exception.  The Independent had on file an obituary written by James Kirkup, whose own obituary in 2009 was noted here.  The piece was written for a full-sized broadsheet, at 2,500 words and brings out a nostalgia within me for a style and depth of writing that seems to have irrevocably passed in journalism.
For the edition of Thursday 26th November, The Independent cut it down to its current page size of 1500 words.  It still unquestionably surpasses the competition and notably addresses Hara's relationship with Ozu, particularly at the end.
The Independent agreed that I could show the unabridged version to scholars, that would otherwise be lost to the record, so I am providing it here.  I've marked the parts that were cut in blue, but I'm not sure that 'KineJapan' transmits colour, so I'll also attach a doc file.Written some twenty years ago, it deploys some unfamiliar english translations of the titles but these will not distract readers here.Roger

The link to the published version is here http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/setsuko-hara-actress-adored-in-japan-and-abroad-for-her-sensitivity-and-best-known-for-her-work-with-a6749256.html
by James Kirkup  July 1998 SETSUKO HARA (Masae Aida) film actress.Born Yokohama17 June, 1920. Died Kamakura.She was theGarbo of Japan, the great shining star of the golden era in Japanese filmmaking. In his autobiography, the actor Ken Takakura, best known for his rolein Sydney Pollock’s The Yakuza, describes the vision of Setsuko Hara walkingthrough the indifferent hordes of commuters in Shinjuku Station: she movedamong them within an indefinable aura of mystery, a physical presence sodiscreet, it could hardly be called present at all. The atmosphere of purityand mystic innocence surrounding her was partly a reflection of her privatelife, shrouded in the utmost discretion.She wasaverse to publicity and rarely gave interviews. She never married, and she isnot known to have had any love affairs. There was a rumour that she might marryYasujiro Ozu, who directed her in most of her finest films, but it was only arumour. Ozu, too, never married, something even now considered abnormalin a Japanese male: he lived with his mother all his life. Women today are moreindependent of social conventions, and many now prefer a career to marriage. Hara wasknown affectionately, regretfully, as “The Eternal virgin.” Setsuko Hara attended the veryrefinedYokohama Ladies’ Seminary from 1933. In August 1934, her fresh, modest yetebullient personality and her radiantly simple beauty led her to be recommendedas a possible addition to Nikkatsu Movie company’s list of ‘new faces’.Her father,Fujinosuke Aida, was a lowly salaryman, but his second daughter had become anactress and the wife of Hisatora Kumagai, a young movie director. Setsuko’splayful charm and a certain childlike spontaneity of feeling hadmade her popular with children, so she had decided to become a schoolteacher.But with the deterioration of her family’s financial situation, she could notenvisage a continuation of higher education.In her firstcasting photos, her skin appeared rather dark. Though she had a fine profile,her frontal shots revealed here as too thin and underdeveloped. Soher first attempt to enter Nikkatsu failed. However her brother-in-law Hisatoraremained convinced that she had the makings of a good actress. Soheinvited the movie company’s casting directors to his home in order to meetSetsuko in a more relaxed atmosphere. The subtle aura she diffused on thatoccasion was enough to persuade the company to engage her.At the time,Nikkatsu had few talented young actresses, so Setsuko seemed likely to fill aneed for a certain type of traditional Japanese girl. In April 1935, she joinedthe Nikkatsu Tamagawa Satsueijo, and in August made her film debut in Tetsu Taguchi’sTamerau nakare Wakandoyo (Don’t hesitate young people!). She was only fifteenyears old. In this young people’s movie, she took the professional name ofSetsuko Hara. Later in 1935, she appeared in Fumito Kurata’s shinya no taiyo(Midnight Sun). It was a ‘B class’ movie of the kind that in those days was runin support of the first feature, ‘A class’ film. But she had the leading role.  In that same year, the leading actress billedto appear in Midori no Chiheisen (Green Horizon) committed suicide. Setsukotook over her part in this first-class ‘A’ movie’. Herperformance revealed her as a potential star, with her happy smile, innocent,open gaze, wide, sparkling eyes and classic profile.In1936 she made Sadao Yamanaka’s Kochiyama Soshun. Yamanaka was a very promisingyoung director who had already made a couple of remarkable early talkies, andwas soon to leave Nikkatsu to work as Ozu’s assistant in Tokyo. He was killedduring the war in Manchuria.Inthose pre-war days, Nazi Germany had a passion for sentimental adventuremovies, love stories set in the mountains. In his book Dr Caligari to Hitler,Siegfried Kracauer writes about the Nazis “idolatry of glaciers and mountainrock faces as symptomatic of the anti-rationalist romanticism of the Germanpsyche exploited by the German leaders.” The director Arnold Fanck was thechief exponent of his nationalist cinematic cult, and his first opus had beennamed, significantly, Der Heilige Berg (The Holy Mountain), 1926, starring theex-dancer Leni Riefenstahl, who was to appear in the five more of Fanck’smovies, none of which achieved the mastery of Die Weisse Holle vom Piz Palu(The White Hell of Piz Palu) co-directed by Pabst in 1929. All Fanck’s movieswere photographed by the celebrated operator Richard Angst.ArnoldFanck arrived from Berlin to make a Japan/German/co-production mountain moviewith Setsuko Hara and Sesshu Hayakawa. Fanck’s co-director was Mansaku Itami(father of the late Juzo Itami). But there was a lot of friction on the setbetween them. In the end, to save face on both sides, two versions had to bemade: Atarashi Tsuchi (New Earth) and Samurai nomusumi (Daughter of the Samurai). In 1937 Setsuko Hara appearedin both versions, which were shown in strict alternation in Japan. The Japaneseaudiences preferred the German version, as more ‘exotic’. Setsuko, the firstJapanese girl to play in a German movie, was a great attraction, and it madeher a real star.She went toGermany for the film’s opening there. After studying German for only one month,she managed to speak the language passably. She travelled in acompany with the famous Japanese pair of movie buyers for Towa Shoji, Nagamasaand Kashiko Kawakita. Hara’s brother-in-law was also one of the delegation. AtTokyo Station, vast crowds had gathered to see them off on 10 March, 1937. Theyjourneyed through Manchuria and on the Trans-Siberian, to arrive on 26 March inBerlin. Setsuko made her first public appearance at the Capitol Theatre,wearing the elegant traditional women’s long-sleeved Kimono known as furisode. Her grace,her youth, her radiant smile and demure demeanour enchanted the Germans.Shemet the great Swiss actress Dorothea Wieok, who had played the sensationalleading role in Leontine Sagan’s Madchen in Uniform, which had been a hugesuccess in Japan. Setsuko possessed some of the spiritual distinction of Wieck,whom she admired as a model for her own acting style. The Germans preferred theJapanese to the German version of the film.Hara went onto Paris, where she met Louis Jouvet, Annabella, Michel Simon and JulienDuvivier. Thento New York and Hollywood, where she encountered Josef von Sternberg, MarleneDietrich, Barbara Stanwyk and the Austrian actress LuiseRainer. It would have been interesting to see Hara in a film by Duvivieror von Sternberg, but apparently no attempt was made to put her undercontract in Paris or Los Angeles.Whenshe returned to Japan, Setsuko Hara joined the Toho Movie Company where in 1937she made Tokai bijoden (Tokai Beauty Legend) directed by Takizo Ishida. Shealso played in a version of Les Miserables, in which she was a very natural,appealing Cosette. In 1938, Satsuo Yamamoto directed her in Kyojinden (Legendof a Great Man) adapted from Andre Gide’s La Symphonie Pastorale. As thetremulously sensitive blind heroine, Setsuko was superbly cast, aninterpretation deeply-thought out. It was Setsuko’s use of the marvellousmyopic gaze in her brilliantly expressive eyes that confirmed her as a greatactress, far superior to Michele Morgan in Delannoy’s1946 version. The Japaneseloved these films with Western backgrounds and characters. Fanck had seen inher a typical Japanese beauty. To the Japanese she seemed to represent a moreEuropean type.Butduring the Pacific War, rigid anti-Western propaganda compelled her to playtypical Japanese young lady parts, and she made few movies during this period.It was therefore not untilthe, end of the war that her career really began to take off, in Kuresawa’sfirst post-war film, Waga seishu ni kuinashi (Mr Springtime, No Regrets) inl946. She acted with real passion, and was an impressive leading lady. Thefilm was voted No. 2 on the list of the year’s best movies. In 1947, she leftToho and joined the new Shin-Toho Movie Company. She became an independentactress and played only in parts that she felt were suited to her, beginningwith Kimisaburo Yoshimura’s Anjoke no butokai (The Anjo Family’s Dance Party),which was chosen as the best film of 1947. Setsuko’s popularitystarted to soar. She always appeared on screen as an intelligent, refined,elegant, serious, young lady. She was untouched by social revolutions inJapanese post-war life, and in that depressed period her enchanting smileseemed to give people consolation and hope for a better future. In theconfusions of post-war society, her delicacy and tenderness were aninspiration.As anactress, she had begun with a rather stiff, mechanical technique, butexperience softened her style and in Yasujiro Ozu’s Banshun (Late spring),1949, with the support of the great Chishu Ryu, she touchedeveryone’s heart as a motherless daughter living with her professor father,taking care of him with true affection and self-effacement, thus missing herchances of marriage, which she finally is persuaded to embark upon at the end. Thereis a wonderfully touching scene between her and Ryu as she leaves him for themarriage ceremony, wearing a superb traditional wedding kimono. This film,the first of several she made with Ozu, was elected No.1 on the year-endcharts.Inthe came year, Keisuke Kinoshita directed her in O-jo-san kampai! (Cheers, oldgirl!) which was only No. 6 on the box-office list. But her performance thesame year in Aoi san miyaku (Blue Mountain) was No. 2 in the annual list. In1949 again, she went on to win the Best Actress Award in the MainichiNewspaper’s Movie Concours.SetsukoHara’smost famous films belong to the 1950s. In 1951, she played in Kurosawa’sHakuchi, based on Dostoevsky’s The Idiot, co-starring with ToshiroMifune and Masayuki Mori. She was Natasha, andthe whole film was shot in northern Japan. Hers was a very dramatic character, themistress of a wealthy man but longing to lead a purer life.In the sameyear, her next film with Ozu, Bakusha (Early Summer) became the year’s No.1hit, followed by the No.2, Mikio Naruse’s Meshi (A Bowl of Rice) in which shegave one of her best performances. Those three films are classics of theJapanese cinema, constantly screened at film festivals andretrospectives.Her director, Ozu, said: “She can act from the very depths of her being, andalways has a quick understanding of her part. When I am giving her direction,she always responds intelligently and instinctively, a wonderful naturalactress.” Ozu’s traditional Japanese interiors, shot from tatami floor level,were perfect settings for her.In 1953 thegreatest of the Ozu/Hara films, Tokyo Monogatari (Tokyo Story) wasmade.The shooting began in June, directed by Hara’s brother-in-law as Ozu’sassistant, and with her second brother as cameraman. The latter was taking ashot of an approaching train in Gotemba station when the train failed to stop intime: he was run over and died on June 6th. In these very sadcircumstances, which intensified the peculiar melancholy of the story, SetsukoHara began playing her greatest part, that of a young war widow,on 20 July. Here again she appears as a devoted daughter-in-law who kindlytakes care of her ageing parents-in-law when they leave their remote countryhome to spend a few days with their son and his rather abrasivewife (the inimitable Haruko Sugiyama) in their cramped Tokyo home.It is adeeply moving film, in which Setsuko’s fine performance is backed by theexcellent characterisations of Chishu Ryu and Chieko Higashiyama as herparents-in-law. Tokyo story is universal in its appeal, and one of the greatestmasterpieces of Japanese cinematographic art.In 1954,Hara made another film with Mikio Naruse, a sensitive version ofYasunari Kawabata’s best novel, Yama no oto (A Rumbling in the mountains).Setsuko now 34, and still unmarried, was at her peak period as anactress, and the very fact that she chose to remain unmarried seemed to add anextra almost ethereal dimension of spiritual distinction to her art. Her lovelyeyes were still full of tenderness and sparkles of mischievous humour. But shehad developed cataract in her left eye: this was successfully operated on atKeio University Hospital. It seemed an omen of coming decline.Herfavourite director, Ozu, had only another ten years to live. Her own fatherdied in 1955. Hara next appeared on the screen in Hisatora Kumagai’s 1955 Non-chan kumo ni noru (Non-chan in the Clouds), based on a well-lovedchildren’s classic by Momoko Ishi. Newspaperheadlines joyfully announced: “Beautiful Eyes Return to the Screen!” The filmmarked another significant step in her career: it was the first time she hadplayed a mother. There followed a succession of almost elegiac autumnal Ozumasterpieces: Tokyo boshoku (Tokyo Twilight) in 1957; Aki biyori (Autumnskies), 1960; and Kohayagawake no aki (Autumn of the Kohayagawa Family), 1961. ThoughSetsuko did not appear in it, Ozu made his last film, Samma no aji (usuallybilled as The Taste of Sake) in 1962. In several of Ozu’s later movies, he hadused younger actresses: Keiko Kishi in Soshun (Early Spring), in 1956; InekoArima in Higanbana (Equinox Flowers), 1958; Mariko Okada in Samma no aji, 1962.None of these women could equal the qualities of Setsuko Hara, herspell-binding quiet intensity and her grace. She began toseem to belong to another age.Hara andOzu: there is an underlying sense of some disturbing secret that emanates fromthese two unmarried artists, the sadness of an emotional difference that theircondition arouses in the spectators, and indefinable strain of sexualperversity. They seem to be telling us that human lives are not what they seem,and that an acceptable social exterior is not everything.In his recent enthrallingbook on Ozu, the critic and scholar Shigehiko Hasumi argues, againstcritics like Paul Schrader, Donald Richie and Audie Bock that all was notsimple sweetness and light in those films made with Setsuko Hara. She wasapparently in love with her much older director, a father-figure who had nointention of marrying anybody, and so treated her rather distantly. UnlikeHasumi, I see their relationship more like that between the dutiful daughterand the father in Banshun: one of pure devotion, with a sublimated sexual need.In 1962,Setsuko appeared in her last movie, one of the countless versions ofChushingura, a historical epic in which she is obviously ill at ease. Sheretired from the screen when she was only forty-two,feeling there were no more parts for her to play. The type of young girl andwoman she had portrayed to such perfection was already vanishing from modernJapan. Like Garbo and Dietrich, she retired not only from the screen, but alsofrom public life. The Japarazzi managed to take only one shot of her at home.She did not want her fans to witness her beauty in decline. The Eternal Virginremained one to the end of her days, her veil or mystery unbroken.Masae Aida (SetsukoHara), actress: born 17 June 1920; died Kanagawa, Japan 5 September 2015.James Kirkup died in2009.  * = Bakushū

      From: Gerow Aaron <aaron.gerow at yale.edu>
 To: Japanese Cinema Discussion Forum <kinejapan at lists.osu.edu> 
 Sent: Wednesday, 25 November 2015, 14:29
 Subject: [KineJapan] Hara Setsuko

The news services report that Hara Setsuko, the star of so many great Japanese films, is dead at age 95. She actually died September 5, but her passing was not announced.

http://www.asahi.com/articles/ASHCT7KPNHCTUCLV01B.html?iref=comtop_6_01
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