Keiko I. McDonald

Keiko McDonald presents a historical overview and outlines a unified approach to Japanese film theory. She analyses a wide range of work, from familiar classics by Ozu and Kurosawa to the films of a younger generation of directors.

Cinema in Context

Reading a Japanese Film

Important connections between Japan's classical theater and its national cinema have been largely unexplored in the West. Japanese Classical Theater in Films breaks new ground by charting the influence that the three major dramatic genres - Noh, Kabuki, and Bunraku - have had on filmmaking. The first part provides historical and cultural background for understanding some of the distinctive features of the impact of the classical theater on the growth of film art. It also surveys how classical plays, such as Chushingura, have continued to enrich the cinema repertoire. The second part presents more detailed analyses with a focus on the director's use of formal properties of the classical theater and the director's adaptation of the play for the screen. Fourteen films chosen for close reading include The Iron Crown, Soshun Kochiyama, and Pandemonium - none of which has been substantially studied outside of Japan before. Noh, Kabuki, and Bunraku are the three distinct genres of classical theater that have made Japan's dramatic art unique. The audience steeped in these traditional theatrical forms sees many aspects of stage conventions in Japanese cinema. This intimacy makes the aesthetic/intellectual experience of films more enriching. Japanese Classical Theater in Films aims at heightening such awareness in the West, the awareness of the influence that these three major dramatic genres have had on Japan's cinematic tradition. Using an eclectic critical framework - a solid combination of historical and cultural approaches reinforced with formalist and auteurist perspectives - Keiko I. McDonald undertakes this much needed, ambitious task. Four postwar Japanese films - Kinoshita's The Ballad of Narayama, Kurosawa's The Throne of Blood and Ran, and Kinugasa's An Actor's Revenge - are chosen to illustrate the stylistics of the traditional theater as an important source of artistic inspiration. The illustration is followed by comparative analyses of classical plays and their screen versions. McDonald examines how major film directors transform originals in ways that clarify new and individual social, ideological, and philosophical visions. For example, Tadashi Imai's Night Drum, Mizoguchi's The Crucified Lovers, and Shinoda's Gonza: the Spearman are used to highlight the filmmakers' modernist responses to the feudal society portrayed by the playwright Monzaemon Chikamatsu. This first major study devoted to connections between Japan's classical theater and its national cinema answers the basic question about cultural specificity that has always concerned McDonald as a teacher and scholar of Japanese cinema: How does a person coming from the Japanese tradition help the Western audience see a Japanese film for what it is?

Japanese Classical Theater in Films

Ugetsu Monogatari has been widely acclaimed as a masterpiece of the Japanese cinema since the moment in 1952 when its director, Kenji Mizoguchi, won a Silver Lion award for the film at the Venice Festival. Western audiences immediately recognized the pictorial beauty of Ugetsu and the lyrical power of Mizoguchi's camera movements, but most viewers have found the film's narrative elements puzzling and unsettling. Ugetsu seems to move between two radically different worlds: the first is a world at war, conveyed with graphic realism; the second, a highly stylized world of the supernatural, filled with ghosts and apparitions. To understand why Mizoguchi chose to incorporate these disparate experiences in one film and ultimately to integrate them requires an awareness of Mizoguchi's customary themes and of cultural contexts that would be familiar to his Japanese audience. This volume presents a complete continuity script of Ugetsu and an introductory essay by Keiko McDonald, analyzing the complex issues of Japanese culture revealed in the film. Also included are a letter from Mizoguchi to his longtime scriptwriter, the late Yoshikata Yoda; the complete texts of the two Japanese tales on which the film was based; Japanese, European and American reviews and commentaries, some appearing for the first time in English; and a filmography and bibliography.

Kenji Mizoguchi, Director

Ugetsu

Kevin J. Wetmore

David Jortner

At the heart of the development of modern Japanese culture, the theatre mirrors the issues and concerns of a society transitioning from the Tokugawa era to the modern period. Modern Japanese Theatre and Performance fills a gap in current Japanese theatre scholarship; the book discusses the role of women in modern theatre, buto dance, experimental theatres that combine traditional theatre with modern forms, and plays by Abe Kobo, Mishima Yukio, and Senda Koreya. With important contributions from both established and emerging scholars, this book is essential reading for anyone interested in theatre, modern performance, or Japanese studies.

Modern Japanese Theatre and Performance

Of all the world s cinemas, Japan's is perhaps unique in its closeness to the nation's literature, past and contemporary. The Western world became aware of this when Akira Kurosawa's Rashomon was awarded the Grand Prize at the Venice film festival in 1951 and the Oscar for best foreign film in 1952. More recent examples include Shohei Imamura's Eel, which won the Palm d'Or (Best Picture) at Cannes in 1997. From Book to Screen breaks new ground by exploring important connections between Japan's modern literary tradition and its national cinema. The first part offers an historical and cultural overview of the working relationship that developed between pure literature and film. It deals with three important periods in which filmmakers relied most heavily on literary works for enriching and developing cinematic art. The second part provides detailed analyses of a dozen literary works and their screen adoptions.

Modern Japanese Literature in Films

From Book to Screen

Modern Japanese Theatre and Performance is a collection of sixteen essays on Japanese theatre, including historical overviews of twentieth century theatre, analyses of specific productions and individuals, and consideration of the intercultural nature of modern Japanese theatre. Also included is a new translation of a 'Superkyogen' play.

Of all the world s cinemas, Japan's is perhaps unique in its closeness to the nation's literature, past and contemporary. The Western world became aware of this when Akira Kurosawa's Rashomon was awarded the Grand Prize at the Venice film festival in 1951 and the Oscar for best foreign film in 1952. More recent examples include Shohei Imamura's Eel, which won the Palm d'Or (Best Picture) at Cannes in 1997.From Book to Screen breaks new ground by exploring important connections between Japan's modern literary tradition and its national cinema. The first part offers an historical and cultural overview of the working relationship that developed between pure literature and film. It deals with three important periods in which filmmakers relied most heavily on literary works for enriching and developing cinematic art. The second part provides detailed analyses of a dozen literary works and their screen adoptions.

Keiko I. McDonald

Books

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