[KineJapan] Ryoki in Ozu's film

[Michael Mc Caskey via KineJapan]

I looked in several Japanese dictionaries, which gave meanings along the
lines of bizarre and grotesque, but the term is used in a different way as
well, at least recently.

There was an original 2001 Korean film, directed by Jae-Young Kwak, which
has the Japanese title Ryouki-teki na kano jo, and the English title Sassy
Girl, I don't know Korean, so I won't attempt to try to put it in roman
letters properly.

This Korean film was then adapted as a popular 2008 Japanese TV drama
series, Ryouki-teki na kano jo, also known in English by the title Sassy
Girl.

Also in 2008,a US version came out, titled My Sassy Girl, directed by Yann
Samuel. It's known in Japanese as Ryouki-teki na kano jo in NYC.

There's also a 2014 Japanese song, part of the title including ryouki-teki,
describing a woman. I think it was a hit, but don't remember the full title.

In your context, it seems to be a male attribute described by a female, but
maybe it has the same sort of "sassy" meaning. In English, I think "sassy"
mainly applies to females, but maybe there's some male analog word that
works in English.

In Japanese popular usage, terms that go way back in slang often don't get
in prestigous dictionaries. I didn't find "sassy" in any dictionaries for
ryouki-teki, but in movie/TV title translations and transmogrifications
instead.

I hope this may help. Miriam was once a student of mine, and also a friend.
She could read Japanese very readily and very well, and I had a great
respect for her. She would have had fun with this question, and I think
would have gone along with "sassy," and then given us a lively English word
for the term as applied to males. She's gone, sadly, so I can only give you
this second-best answer.

Miriam would have also loved it if this answer of mine should lead to
lively group discussion, strong disagreements, etc.

Michael McCaskey
Georgetown University

On Saturday, April 23, 2016, Kukhee Choo <kukheechoo at hotmail.com> wrote:

> Hi all,
>
>
> I have a question about how the term "ryoki" is adopted in Ozu's film *Where
> now are the dreams of youth? *(Seishun no yume ima izuko, 1932). There's
> a scene where the male protagonist Tetsuo tries to repulse a Moga female
> who's interested in him, but instead of getting turned off, she becomes
> more attracted to him and says "ryokiteki de iiwa."
>
>
> Considering that the literal term of ryoki means grotesque bizarre acts of
> violence, but with Miriam Silverberg's Ero Guro Nansensu in mind, I was
> wondering whether there are any other film examples where the term ryoki is
> utilized in such a manner?
>
>
> Thank you!
>
>
> K Choo
>
>
>
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