Haru no mezame / Spring's Awakening (1947)
Michael Kerpan
and a delightful surprise. It turns out to be a slice of life film,
centered around a couple of years in the life of a rural high school
girl -- played by 16 year old Yoshiko Kuga (future star in Portrait of
Madame Yuki, Banka, Equinox Flower, Good Morning) -- still a tiny bit
plumpish -- and not full grown. Almost no plot to speak of -- just
normal events of school and home life and hanging around with friends.
She gets grounded after one unauthorized coed outing (which a friend
has unwisely photographed), she gets upset when one male acquaintance
kisses her without approval, and gets sad when the boy she likes best
is sent to a better school in Tokyo by his parents. A family maid gets
pregnant (without benefit of marriage). This is as relaxed and
good-natured a film as Naruse ever made. (He out-Shimizus Shimizu here
-- in this respect).
Interestingly, virtually none of Kuga's female classmates here seem to
have gone on to a career in films (despite offering nice, natural
performances). We also see (in supporting roles) a surprisingly young
looking (and pretty) Haruko Sugimura as Kuga's mother and a slightly
youngish Takashi Shimura (who looks much the same as we know him from
Kurosawa's films).
Michael Kerpan
the second time around as the first. ;~}
(To Dan -- the "Floating Clouds" book arrived. Thanks.)
Dan Sallitt
http://groups.google.com/group/NaruseRetro/browse_thread/thread/476c6dbd9b6cc311
> This is as relaxed and good-natured a film as Naruse ever made.
I was in Boston yesterday, and Michael and I watched this film, without
subtitles but with Michael providing help with the plot. As I feared, it
was pretty much impossible to tell whether or not I liked the film, even
with a grasp of the story. To my mind, Naruse triggers so many of his
effects off of little things: individual lines of dialogue, reactions to
the lines, delivery of the lines.
However: it was completely fascinating to see Naruse's characteristic
style imposed on the material, even if I was unable to reap the artistic
benefits of the style. It was plain as day when the linchpin scene
arrived, the scene where Naruse gathers up the elements of the "shadow
story" and thrusts his covert narrative to the surface: not only did the
usually reserved Kuga let out her anger for the only time in the film, but
Naruse also adopted a distinctive, agitated rhythm, with the characters
moving into big closeups that replaced the usual space-preserving
master-shot-heavy decoupage. And, without my knowing exactly what was
going on with the story, I could tell that this tempest was somehow
glancing off of the main story line: it involved Kuga and her mother
Sugimura, whereas most of the scenes had pointed us toward tensions within
the group of teenage friends. As usual, a very few, pacific scenes
followed this climax, dissipating its energy before the end title.
So, without knowing whether the film is good or bad, I know that it's a
real Naruse film, and not just an exercise that he didn't try to
transform. Unfortunately, I have no idea how to take my exploration of
this film any further.... - Dan
Michael Kerpan
scenes near the end. Just too many words, too fast. Even Japanese
subtitles would be a benefit -- but even these are unavailable (and not
likely to be available).
While I agree that dialog in Naruse's films is far from unimportant --
I have found that (for my purposes) I can enjoy his films immensely
despite only an imperfect understanding of conversational details.
Only one film so far (Bara gassen / War of the Roses) left me high and
dry due to too much focus on dialog and too little revelation by
visuals.
After you left, I did yet another traversal of the film (skipping a
bit), and started piecing more of the missing (or out of place) details
together. It doesn't help that the few published comments on this film
are almost totally inaccurate.
What I think goes on at the quasi-climax is this -- a presentation of
the disjunction between the parental notion that children can somehow
be protected by keeping them in ignorance of life's messy details
(unplanned, illicit pregnancies -- for instance) and our heroine's
belief that she needed to be told necessary truths.
While I believe that it is possible (for me at least) to appreciate a
film like this despite lack of full knowledge of dialog, there is no
doubt that ability to understand the dialog enhances one's appreciation
considerably. Alas -- since this was left out of not only the
centennial retrospective but also the even larger one at the 1998 San
Sebastian film Festival (39 or 40 films), the chances of this appearing
in subtitled form anytime soon would appear to be close to zero. Given
a choice between unsubtitled now -- and (maybe) subtitled in 50 years
or so -- I'll happily choose the unswubbed present. ;~}
Michael Kerpan
(at least to me). Strange.
Dan Sallitt
> scenes near the end.
No, you did an excellent job. Even if we knew exactly what was going on,
though, I feel as if the lower level of detail would be important to me.
> the chances of this appearing in subtitled form anytime soon would
> appear to be close to zero. Given a choice between unsubtitled now --
> and (maybe) subtitled in 50 years or so -- I'll happily choose the
> unswubbed present.
I was actually very pleased that I could see Naruse's strategy and his
ambition even without knowing the dialogue. So this screening was a good
experience for me. And I definitely feel encouraged to discover that this
totally unknown film looks quite mature in terms of style. The sprinkling
of Naruse films we've seen from 1936-1950 are sufficient to establish that
this was not nearly as dry a period as many commentators have assumed. -
Dan