[KineJapan] Bowing before Eastwood

Mon Mar 12 08:15:03 EDT 2018

As you say, Japanese directors often focus on decidedly non-mainstream figures, and films too. It's possible to find American directors and academics speaking positively about Hooper's Texas Chain Saw Massacre, or Salem's Lot and Poltergeist, but in Kurosawa's opinion Hooper's best films are Lifeforce (a Hammer tribute that's generally considered at best an amusing bit of fluff) and Spontaneous Combustion, a film that is usually only mentioned when describing just how bad Hooper's post-TCSM career has become. Finding westerners defending either of those works is virtually impossible. 

Jim Harper.

On Fri, 9/3/18, Japanese Cinema Discussion Forum via KineJapan <kinejapan at lists.osu.edu> wrote:

 Subject: Re: [KineJapan] Bowing before Eastwood
 To: "Japanese Cinema Discussion Forum" <kinejapan at lists.osu.edu>
 Date: Friday, 9 March, 2018, 14:01

 Knowing a
 number of filmmakers who studied under Hasumi, I know about
 this love for Eastwood. It can be explained in part by a
 refusal to do ideological film analysis, by respect for a
 great one who can’t be criticized (like Hasumi himself),
 and by a very different view of American cinema than the one
 many American academics have. I once tried to discuss this
 with Aoyama Shinji around the time Lost in America came out
 in 2000. 
 Do
 remember that greats like Kurosawa Kiyoshi are fans of films
 most American academics have forgotten. I’m not just
 talking about Tobe Hooper, who was like God to Kurosawa-san,
 but directors like Richard Fleischer. When Kurosawa came to
 Yale, he talked at length and gave a precise analysis of a
 scene from Fleischer's Boston Strangler. 
 The
 Takeshi switch is interesting, but it won’t work because
 Takeshi is treated the same as Eastwood. I might have
 written a book on him, but I will admit Takeshi has made
 some bad films. But someone like Abe Kasho will never admit
 it.
 Aaron
 Gerow

 2018/03/09 午後10:12、Japanese
 Cinema Discussion Forum via KineJapan <kinejapan at lists.osu.edu>
 のメール：

 I just had
 the Eastwood fight too, and we got into Eastwood's
 recent political speech.  The position in defense of his
 films was that Eastwood the crank is isolated outside the
 work, which stands on its own as storytelling craft or
 whatever.  I haven't seen the new film, and don't
 intend to, but I would like to hear someone try to make the
 argument that this material is isolated from ideology!  I
 wish I'd thought of Jeremy's clever Takeshi switch
 when I was fighting this one out.
 The Japan Times
 article is great.  I laughed out loud several times while
 reading it.
 Ryan
 (Cook)From: KineJapan
 <kinejapan-bounces+ryan.cook=emory.edu at lists.osu.edu>
 on behalf of Japanese Cinema Discussion Forum via KineJapan
 <kinejapan at lists.osu.edu>
 Sent: Friday,
 March 9, 2018 7:58:23 AM
 To: Japanese
 Cinema Discussion Forum
 Subject: Re:
 [KineJapan] Bowing before Eastwood I was wondering about this,
 Mark. All the people I've had the Clintwood argument
 with are men. I do think his swaggering masculinity is part
 of the attraction. Combined with auteurism, it's a heady
 mix.
 Markus
 --- 
 Markus
 NornesProfessor of Asian
 CinemaDepartment of Screen Arts and
 Cultures, Department
 of Asian Languages and Cultures, Penny Stamps School of Art &
 Design
 Department of Screen Arts and
 Cultures6348 North
 Quad105 S. State
 StreetAnn Arbor, MI
 48109-1285

 On Fri, Mar 9, 2018 at
 12:23 PM, Japanese Cinema Discussion Forum via
 KineJapan <kinejapan at lists.osu.edu> wrote:
 Thanks
 for the reference to Stéphane Bouquet's book,
 Jeremy.
 I
 guess a follow-up question would be: is the "Eastwood
 effect" in Japan similar to what Bouquet describes
 amongst audiences in France. I.e., does his work enjoy a
 generally favorable reception, not so much because of any
 quality of his films, but rather because of an aura that
 surrounds the man himself, an imaginary of "la vieille
 Amérique, ... l’Amérique idéale" ?
 M.
 RobertsUniversity of Tokyo
 Center for Philosophy (UTCP)
 On Mar 9, 2018, at 11:17, Japanese
 Cinema Discussion Forum via KineJapan <kinejapan at lists.osu.edu>
 wrote:
 Wow, yeah. I've had the
 American Sniper fight too. Good read, this
 article.
 I want to concede that
 being from the same country can leave one blind to an
 artist's beauty, but it's so true that no one will
 ever say what they think is so *good* about his movies. And
 it’s not like they’re all terrible enough to knock down
 one by one. They just don’t feel very meticulously
 considered or crafted. It has led to many very frustrating
 nights of drinking with othewise great friends (possibly on
 this list?) - cinefils and movie lovers. The first time it
 started happening, around 2008, I went and watched every
 movie he’d made for the previous ten years. And they just
 don’t even begin to warrant comparisons to other American
 masters—say John Ford, whose name has come up in these
 conversations. (nor, per the article, Hitchcok and
 Ozu)
 I do have a modest
 response to (Japanese) people I’ve met who were apparently
 moved by Gran Torino as some kind of redemption for US wars
 in Asia, which is to ask them to imagine the same movie made
 by and starring Takeshi as a racist cold-hearted war
 veteran, with the audience laughing along with him cursing
 up a storm of racial slurs for the first half, until he
 warms to some delicious food and underage kids whom only he
 can save, through literal sacrifice in a shower of cherry
 blossoms. Set in Okubo or someplace. Call the film
 Yamazakura or Yaezakura or something.This comparision
 doesn’t work for Eastwood fans who don’t like Gran
 Torino though.
 Apparently it’s a
 scourge in France too:  Clint
 Fucking Eastwood "Eastwood a le
 droit à un étrange traitement de faveur qui s’explique,
 me semble-t-il, par le fait qu’on a cru, et continue à
 croire, au fétiche. Il y a une façon d’héroïsation du
 cinéaste qui fonctionne à plein chez les spectateurs,
 comme s’ils étaient contents d’avoir encore un objet à
 vénérer. Je pousserais volontiers un pas plus loin en
 précisant que le fétiche que vénèrent les spectateurs
 français ce n’est pas seulement l’homme Eastwood mais
 l’homme qui se prend pour la vieille Amérique, pour
 l’Amérique idéale."

 Jeremy HarleyMabashi Movie
 Festival
 On Thu, Mar 8, 2018 at
 7:15 PM, Japanese Cinema Discussion Forum via KineJapan <kinejapan at lists.osu.edu> wrote:
 Is Hasumi
 really that influential at Kinema Junpo?
 On Thu, Mar 8, 2018 at 6:11 PM
 Japanese Cinema Discussion Forum via KineJapan <kinejapan at lists.osu.edu>
 wrote:
  Nice Hadfield article on the
 critical fawning for Clint Eastwood on Japan. I once had a
 conversation with Funahashi-san about American Sniper that
 devolved into an argument where neither of us could
 understand the other or care to budge. Since then I
 studiously avoid the subject. I can’t say Hadfield has
 cracked the Clint Code—-unless I is, indeed, Hasumi’s
 fault—- but it’s an entertaining read.
 Markus
 https://www.japantimes.co.jp/c
 ulture/2018/03/07/films/clint-
 eastwoods-japan-critics-always -make-day/-- 
 --- 
 Markus
 NornesProfessor of Asian
 CinemaDepartment of Screen Arts and
 Cultures, Department
 of Asian Languages and Cultures, Penny Stamps School of Art &
 Design
 Department of Screen Arts and
 Cultures6348 North
 Quad105 S. State
 StreetAnn Arbor, MI
 48109-1285
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