MovieChat Forums > Yoidore tenshi (1959) Discussion > Did Kurosawa have U.S. occupation backin...

Did Kurosawa have U.S. occupation backing/blessing?


My housemate and myself were struck by Kurosawa's blanket condemnation of the Yakuza in this film. We were curious: how did he get away with such comments about the powerful criminal organization?

I am asking those who may have a better understanding of Kurosawa's bio, as I have seen many of his films but have not really read much about him or his life. Was he ever threatened or in danger from the Yakuza? Did he have the blessing or clandenstine backing of the U.S. occupation government as he made this film, or films during this period? I can see, from the perspective of US forces, the social utility of Drunken Angel, with its criticism of the criminal element operating in the slums without even a visual reference to the US occupation (besides the storefront signs in English).

I can also see, theoretically, how the US would have possibly been interested in developing Kurosawa as a valuable cultural asset in post-War Japan. After all, the film industry has always been one of the primary means in which the US has exported its culture to the rest of the world. I am also aware that Kurosawa's work did and perhaps still does face some sort of scepticism or weariness from the Japanese domestic audience because of his affiliation with and importance to the Western world.

So, I am asking those better informed than me, who can provide more than speculation: is any information that you can point me to that will confirm or deny these musings? Did Kurosawa or any one involved in funding his movies, have a relationship with the United States occupation forces? If not, how the hell did he manage to diss the Yakuza so forcefully? And also, why has it been said that the Japanese have not embraced Kurosawa more wholly?

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To answer a little out of order: Kurosawa really, really hated the Yakuza. He saw them as a blight to Japanese society in that they offered a false sense of honor and prestige, as well as for their flaunting a libertine lifestyle. I don't know from any biography what his day to day interaction with the Yakuza might have been (he doesn't go into it in his autobiography, though I admit it's been years since I've read it.) The Criterion DVD has a great commentary by Donal Ritchie, who was actually on- set for "Drunken Angel", and he mentions quite a bit about Kurosawa's general hatred for the Yakuza. Simply put, they were just not simpatico.
As for the first question, it's probably doubtful that he had some kind of US backing. There's nothing mentioned in Galbraith's massive "Emperor and the Wolf", about the Kurosawa/Mifune collaborations, and nothing indicates that he was entirely sympathetic to the occupation, either; remember that part of the problems of the slums in "Angel" stem from the results of the war and the occupation. While Kurosawa might have seen their presence as a "modernizing" influence, he was ambivalent, I think, about just how helpful they could be. According to his autobiography, like most Japanese of the era, he was an Imperialist until the end of the war (his story involves the "Death of the 100 Million", in which the population of Japan would have committed suicide upon defeat, and how he was ready to do so).
It is true that the Occupation certainly did not like the Yakuza either, simply from a "law and order" persepective: the Yakuza ran a massive black market in post- War Japan and even fought the US army, most notoriously when the Yamaguchi- gumi branch of the Yakuza actively engaged the US military in Kobe for almost five years after the end of the War. But it's doubtful they would have funded it directly; the occupation had it's own propaganda arm. It is likely that Toho might have wanted to seem sympathetic and in line with the occupation, and put out a film that was amenable to its goals.
As for your last point, a lot of Japanese skepticism of Kurosawa tends to have to do with his being seen as an "Old Wave" filmmaker, and how "Western" his films are in story, structure and theme (though this can be debated, too- many of his films are uniquely Japanese). He certainly was in awe of Western filmmakers, and their hand is evident in his work. Much in the way a modern American audience member might look at an old Hollywood film from the 1930's and find it "out of touch", so many Japanese evidently felt that Kurosawa was a relic from an earlier time by the end of his career.
For more information, you might want to check out Kurosawa's own "Something Like an Autobiography", Stuart Galbraith IV's, "The Emperor and the Wolf", and the documentary "Akira Kurosawa: It Is Wonderful to Create".

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Actually, this particular film was heavily censored by the Americans occupying post-war Japan. If you watch the documentary that comes with the film on the Criterion edition, you'll learn that Kurosawa disliked the Westernization of his country. What seems like a blanket condemnation for the yakuza was actually taking a snipe at certain aspects of Western culture: the clothes, the music the drinking, the dance hall girls, materialism - all of which seemed to be detrimental to society.

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It's always seemed strange to me that post-war Japan adopted the ways of the occupying power so quickly. As you say, the dance, the music, the style - "Social Club of Tokyo"? Can you imagine the reverse happening, if it had been the other way round?

In High and Low the name of the shoe company is "National Shoes". In English. What sort of "national" is that, then?

Kambei of the Gormful Gumi.

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Suzume-san wrote:

It's always seemed strange to me that post-war Japan adopted the ways of the occupying power so quickly. As you say, the dance, the music, the style - "Social Club of Tokyo"?

It seems many Westerners think that way, as if Japan's "Westernization" (or "modernization") begun in 1945.
It's probably due to the lack of the knowledge about pre-WWII Japan.
(I'm not criticizing. My own knowledge about histories/culture of other countries is very limited.)

I found similar comments on Stray Dog board titled "Western cultural influences *Possible Spoilers*"
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0041699/board/thread/91256421?d=91256421&a mp;p=1#91256421

I posted a reply there with an excerpt from Donald Ritchie's audio commentary on Criterion's Drunken Angel DVD:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0041699/board/thread/91256421?d=117451663&; amp;p=1#117451663

If you have listened to his commentary, maybe that's enough...
but allow me to write more about this topic, although it deviates too much from the original topic of this thread.


Bottom line:
Simply put, after WWII, Japanese contniued what was interrupted by militarism and the war, not started something completely new.
Let me explain with examples.


Fashion
By 1920s, Western suits have become common for men when they were at work or in public places.
In their cases, they might do it just because they were asked to, because most of them changed to Japanese clothes when they were at home.

On the other hand, in 1920s-30s, some younger urban people (including women in this case) chose Western haircuts and clothes because they loved such style.
They were called "mobo" and "moga" (abbreviations of "modern boy" and "modern girl" respectively).
They looked like these:
http://www.hamakei.com/img/headline/1214120972_photo.jpg
http://park.org/Japan/NTT/DM/images/RF011100.gif

However in 1940, "luxury is enemy" was a slogan. Simple "national clothes" were recommended.
Permanent hair wave was forbidden (which only had to do with wealthy women, though).


Jazz was introduced to Japan in 1910s and became popular by mid-1930s.
I'm not a jazz fan myself, but it seems many fans consider 1935 was the "peak" of Japanese jazz before it was banned in 1943 as "enemy's music".

Though I haven't read it, one Japanese blogger recommended this book on this topic:
"Blue Nippon: Authenticating Jazz in Japan" by E. Atkins
http://www.amazon.com/Blue-Nippon-Authenticating-Jazz-Japan/dp/0822327 21X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1235365622&sr=1-1


Dance hall was a place you could enjoy big jazz band performance back then. But banned in 1940,
(Some argue they were not officially banned, but simply went out of business because of the the rise of militarism.)


Baseball was introduced to Japan in 1871.
This video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLFq3txg_GM
tells the history of the baseball league of universties in Tokyo from 1903 to 1925.
From 4:28 on, it shows the game in 1925. You'll see they were quite popular.
The league was cancelled in 1943, till the end of WWII.

In 1934, the professional baseball league started, but became inactive in 1944. They officially restarted it in 1946.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SRNr9sUqRZI gives a glimpse of Japanese professional baseball in 1936.


Foreign movies
According to an article in a Japanese magazine issued in 1942,
before 1937 (that is, Marco Polo Bridge Incident),
roughly 770 movies were released in Japan in one year. Among them
470 were Japanese movies,
250 were American movies, and
50 were European movies.

(As you can see, there's a big difference between American and European movies.
The reason is that American studios such as RKO and UA
distributed their movies through their own Japanese branches,
but Europeans were not.)

Naturally, some foreign movie stars were very popular.
Charles Chaplin's visit to Japan in 1932 was a sensation.
This newspapaer http://www.adagio-tokyo.com/0708/detail070801/images/im_pho3.jpg
tells he was received by massive crowd of fans.

After 1937, American movies sufferred long delays in Japan.
For example, 1938 movie The Adventures of Robin Hood was released in Japan in 1940.
http://syasinsyuu.cool.ne.jp/eiga/51.jpg
But at least they were released until 1941.

You can see more Japanese ads of foreign movies released before 1941 here:
http://syasinsyuu.cool.ne.jp/eiga/youga1.htm
(They were mostly ads on magazines, not posters used in theatres.)

Japanese film critic Nagaharu Yodogawa once talked about his recollection.
Right after he heard the news of the attack on Pearl Harbor,
he came across a movie theatre that was showing an American movie.
Then he thought "Pity. They won't show American movies anymore."
It tells even in Dec. 1941, Japanese people were enjoying Amercian movies.


Business
In terms of capitalism, pre-WWII Japan was arguably much Westernized than post-WWII Japan.
Many elements of the "Japanese management" (such as lifetime employment) were invented after WWII.
Before WWII, employees were easily fired, and managers care much about their investors than their employees.
In a way, Japanese companies those days were much like American companies today.


Documentary films:
There are some documentary films that captured pre-WWII Japan.

Japan of 1930's (color): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9BXPaz6KZvE
The first 2 mins ("Floral Japan" segment) shows "Japaneasy" aspect,
but from "Modern Tokyo" segment on, you'll see very much "Westernized" aspect of Japan back then.

Japan in 1920s-1930s (B&W)
Pt.1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eDjHioHYtuo
1:15-1:30 a "revue" featuring dancing girls
2:15-2:46 most working men wore western suits.

Pt.2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9GyPAr2eaAQ
4:00-4:45 mobo, moga, dance hall, etc.

(YouTube has more similar clips about pre-WWII Japan,
maybe you can find them in "related videos".)


Another thing. Suzume-san wrote:
In High and Low the name of the shoe company is "National Shoes". In English. What sort of "national" is that, then?
There was a Japanese company actually used "National" as their brand: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_(brand)
It's not that different from Western companies using Japanese words such as Atari or Ryko as their brand.

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Thanks, Jadow, what an informative post. I'll follow all that up.

Actually, I have thought of an example the same thing happening in the opposite direction - late Victorian Europe's craze for Japanese design, spoofed in The Mikado. What fun.

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It's always seemed strange to me that post-war Japan adopted the ways of the occupying power so quickly. As you say, the dance, the music, the style - "Social Club of Tokyo"? Can you imagine the reverse happening, if it had been the other way round?


Perhaps a strong case could be made that the reverse has been taking place, in particular since WWII, but long before as well. Look up Lafcadio Hearn sometime and you'll discover that there's always been some form of cultural interchange taking place between the two countries since 1854 (to a greater or lesser degree).

Years ago, I attended a tea ceremony in Seattle. After the ceremony was over, I had a chat with the fellow who conducted it (a westerner) and he said something that I'll long remember. The gist of his remark was, "We're preserving tea ceremony because, one day, we might give it back to Japan." IOW: the Japanese, from his perspective, did not value things like the tea ceremony the way they once did. If his assessment is correct, there may exist a need for things like tea ceremony to be preserved (somehow, somewhere) and again made part of Japanese culture at some point in the future if Japan's interest in traditional Japanese ways continues to wane.

Anime, too, is a strong influence on American culture. I think it's safe to say that anime and manga have by now become more or less mainstream cultural artifacts in the US. With them, a bit of Japanese culture has also insinuated itself into the American bloodstream.

I also can't help notice the prevalence of Japanesee Kanji character tattoos in the US. Besides the "cool factor," it's also worth pointing out that such tattoos are likely to be much less painful than spelling out the same idea or phrase in English (i.e. having the Kanji character for "Blood and Guts" done on your arm is simpler than having "Blood and Guts" done in English).

There's the additional advantage of most Westerners being unable to read Kanji. From my own perspective, half the allure of such tattoos is that the bearer has to tell the onlooker what the tattoo means: you can't read it for youself. That being the case, making a poor choice in tattoos is much less of a big deal than if the tattoo is done in English (so the tattoo you got on your neck that says "World's Biggest Retard" in Kanji need not necessarily be a source of concern the morning after).

In fact, just casting glances around my own home, I can see the influence of Japanese culture: a My Neighbor Totoro poster adorns a door and a copy of You are all Sanpaku lies on a shelf, (as does a copy of Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things). In fact, one of my most prized possessions is a Badtz-Maru cup cover I bought in the interests of keeping dust and lint out of my tea mug between uses (and between sips). I say "prized" because it's one of those eminently practical things you wonder how you ever got along without, yet western shops don't seem to offer anything like it.

(To say nothing of the Kurosawa film festival currently taking place, the next screening of which I just double-checked the time of in another tab; Drunken Angel was shown earlier in the week, [along with Stray Dog] which is how I ended up here.)

Anyhow, you get the idea: the cultural influence hasn't necessarily been exclusively in one direction. :)








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It's my understanding that Kurosawa felt Drunken Angel was the first film he could direct without government interference.

That said, the U. S. Army pre-approved all film scripts in Occupied Japan. I'm not aware that they cut any of Kurosawa's films post-production, but they were significantly involved in what themes could be portayed on both the screen and throughout Japanese media. They did edit some films by others in post-production, most notably a film highly critical of the Emporer. The American military believed that the Japanese monarchy was necessary to maintaining civil order.

Kurosawa was no stranger to managing bureaucrats. He rose through Japan's "studio system" during the pre-war and war years, and for Japan the war began in July 1938. Cajoling and confronting military cultural advisors would not have been anything new.

The question of Kurosawa's view toward the Yakuza isn't clear in my mind. Since all themes were approved, it can be assumed that somewhere in the American military someone signed off on gangster themes. It is possible that the American military felt capitalistic gangsters were preferable to communists, of which Japan (and Toho) had a few.

Did Kurosawa promote Western culture and organized crime? The portrayal of gangsters as people who dress stylishly, terrorize small merchants, spend huge sums on women, alcohol, and gambling, and who die from violence and disease certainly shapes young audiences in developing their perceptions. It's helpful to remember that on some level, (almost) all publicity is good publicity. It's true Matsunaga was very popular with women in the marketplace and clubs, and feared by others. Those are big themes in young audiences, and young people are less frightened by death and disease. It's fair to consider these aspects with greater scrutiny because, as mentioned above, all of Japanese film up to 1945 was directly controlled by the Imperial government. Japanese film makers knew by instict and by trade what would shape audience perceptions, maybe even moreso than those running the U.S. Occupation.

Was Kurosawa ever threatened by the Yakuza? Everyone in the film business has been threatened by criminal elements. It's like the studio director in The Godfather (1972) when he tells Tom Hagen, "And if that gumbah tries any rough stuff, you tell him I ain't no band leader! Yeah, I heard that story.... "

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i'm sure kurosawa hated them, but the censors loving yakuza bashing didn't hurt. in the documentary on the DVD they show actual pages on the script with handwritten notes from the american censor praising the scene where the doctor stands up to the yakuza boss. This is probably why other things were allowed to stay, and i'm sure kurosawa knew that.

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