Estimated reading time: 9 minutes
With the demise of Kanto Shinto, Takaji Wakamatsu, and Nagisa Oshima, and the retirement of Masahiro Shinoda and Kishige Yoshida, Yoji Yamada, who is still active, is one of the leading Japanese directors today. At the beginning of this century, the success of "Dusk Kiyobei" (2002) and "Hidden Sword Ghost Claw" (2004) led to a yamada boom in Japan, pushing him to the level of a master.
Prior to this, some Japanese critics only regarded Yamada as a mass producer of the "Man's Suffering" series and the "Fishing Fool's Diary" series, although it was a box office guarantee, but it was difficult to reach the realm of the master. Up to now, overseas film critics, including Hong Kong, have also recognized that Yamada's works are full of humanistic feelings. The author wants to use this series to sort out a simple and simple image of Yamada for readers.
Instead of starting from scratch, start with Yoji Yamada's entry experience. He graduated from the Faculty of Law of the University of Tokyo in 1954 and applied for assistant positions in Shochiku after enlisting in different trades. Then, the rest is history? No, he lost. However, in that year, Nichiren resumed production and poached major film companies, especially the behind-the-scenes personnel, who were most easily poached, and Masahira Imamura and Kiyoshun Suzuki were all assistant directors who switched from Shochiku to Nichihasu during this period.
Shochiku, who took the lead in switching to Nichijo, helped Guide Nishikawa Tokji, and suggested that Nichijo hire candidates who were not hired by Shochiku, and Yamada was invited to apply for the examination and was allowed to be hired by Nichiho. However, Shochiku wants to fill the poached assistant and beckons to Yamada, who was originally unsuccessful. When Yamada attended a film conference at university, he met director Safu Yamamoto, and Yamada asked him for his opinion, and Yamamoto thought it was okay to do both. Yamada had to think for himself, remembering that the director Hideo Ohitei, who interviewed him in Shochiku, impressed him and decided to join Shochiku.
Also taking the Shochiku exam first, and then Taking the Nichiren exam was Urayama Kiriro, but he did not get a good entry test in Nichiho and was not hired, fortunately, Yamada chose Shochiku, and Urayama was able to join Nichiho, and in 1962, he made his first work " Street with Iron Furnace " . Many years later, Urayama laughed at Yamada, and if Yamada joined Nichiho, not only would he not be able to enter the film world, but it would also make the Japanese film industry less likely to have the superstar Yoshinaga Sayuri. At the age of seventeen, Yoshinaga became a star with "Street with Iron Furnaces".
Yamada's experience, tortuous and like fate, also foreshadows his life trajectory, that is, a pattern of "reserve becoming a big general". In the same year, he joined Shochiku's new assistant director Nagisa Oshima, who was talented and proud of heaven, and was promoted by Shochikusha Great Wall Toshiro in 1959 to become a director early with "Street of Love and Hope", and then triggered the "New Wave of Shochiku" with "The Cruel Story of Youth" (1960). He was a young man, but he could not push down the high wall of existing power, and left Shochiku in disgrace.
Yamada failed to make his mark during the Shochiku New Wave, and only directed for the first time in 1961, where he was gradually weighted by Shochiku and made a film version of Man's Suffering in 1969. Shochiku's top brass originally opposed the start of filming, but Jodo Shiro's exclusive public approval, the film was applauded, and it could not be stopped, and 48 episodes were filmed in 26 years to support Shochiku's summer vacation and New Year's schedule. It is not an exaggeration to say that he has a share that shochiku does not have to be like Daiei and Nichiren, which did not top in the downturn of Japanese cinema.
<h2 toutiao-origin="h4" > first assistant director and then screenwriter</h2>
Yamada and his family returned to Japan from northeast China after the war, living a life of three meals, helping the family when they were in middle school, and working part-time to pay for their own tuition and living expenses at university. Yamada joins Shochiku, and the studio canteen has an endless amount of white rice, which has made him feel like heaven. In 1955, Yamada established a family, and his wife was an outsider, whom they had met the previous year. The marriage lasted for fifty-three years until the death of his wife in 2008.
Nagisa Oshima and Akira Kurosawa both had good stories of diligently creating scripts during their assistant directors periods, aiming to be directors. Even if Yamada writes the script in his spare time, the motivation is money, because the assistant director's salary is not high, and it may not be enough in the future. In 1955, he won the first place in the Script Award of the Japan New Film Directors Association with "Bee Pupae" (Bee Pupae), with a prize of 80,000 yuan (Yen, the same below), which was the first time he made money by writing a script, and his assistant director's monthly salary was only 11,000 or 2,000 yuan. "Bee Pupae" was made into an educational film by Toei in 1957, but this 50-minute novella was only screened in educational institutions such as schools, and has not yet been released on a DVD.
Yamada has been an assistant director for directors such as Yuzo Kawashima and Shibuya, but the closest to him is Nomura Yoshitaro. Yamada's eyes nomura is a quick-witted and skilled director, and he can quickly judge what method to use to shoot a play, whether it is worth overspending, and other issues. Nomura asked Yamada to co-write the script with him, and Nomura's "Thirteen Thousand Yuan a Month" (1958), which was Yamada's first screenplay, also made his name appear in the opening subtitles of Shochiku films for the first time.
When Yamada first learned to write a screenplay, he thought that drama was the basis of film scripts, so he spent a year listening to the rehearsals of stage directors Tomo and Shigeru after work every day. Another object of study is the famous screenwriter Shinobu Hashimoto, Nomura's "Focus of Zero" (1961) adapted from Matsumoto Kiyoharu's mystery novel, the script was co-edited by Hashimoto and Yamada, the actual writing process, Nomura sent Yamada to Hashimoto Province as his assistant, collation and revision of Hashimoto. Yamada benefited greatly from this and regarded Hashimoto as his teacher.
In 1962, the two adapted another Matsumoto Kiyoharu novel " The Instrument of Sand " for Nomura " , but after the script was completed , it could not be filmed until 1974 , which is a masterpiece in the history of Japanese cinema. In addition, Yamada's 1965 "Flag of Mist" is also Matsumoto's original work, but written by Hashimoto alone, and is the only one of Yamada's works in which Yamada is not involved in the script.
< h2 toutiao-origin="h4" > the new director's frustration: Strangers on the Second Floor</h2>
The "Shochiku New Wave" was given to the Japanese media for The Cruel Tale of Youth, and after Nagisa Oshima, Osamu Takahashi, Masahiro Shinoda, Kishige Yoshida, Musato Tamura, and Hidetaro Morikawa were all promoted to directors early in 1960. The works of the "Shochiku New Wave" originally had the orientation of truthfully reflecting the contemporary youth and social outlook, rebelling against Shochiku's "big ship tune" or "women's film", but at the end of the same year, "Japan Night and Fog" was left early because a politician was assassinated by a radical youth, causing Oshima to leave Shochiku the following year, and the works of a group of newcomers could not do the box office that Johto wanted, and Johto decided to stop the pace of innovation. In 1961, Shochiku reduced the scale of production, except that Shinoda was able to shoot one after another, and a number of "Shochiku New Wave" directors had almost no chance to make films.
However, Yamada was given the opportunity to make his first film in 1961 at the recommendation of Nomura. Strangers on the Second Floor (二階の人) is an SP (sister picture, sister film). At that time, The Japanese film industry was led by Toei to play a double feature screening form, first playing about an hour of novellas, and then playing the main feature films. Shochiku treats SP as a "test card" work for new directors and places it at the front of the feature film. "Street of Love and Hope", which is also an hour long, is an SP. The answer to why "sisters" are not "brothers" is that Shochiku is dominated by women's films.
The film is adapted from the mystery novel of Kyo Takigawa, after the office worker Ye Muro got married, he borrowed money from his eldest brother to build a two-story house, they lived on the lower floor, rented out the upper floor to pay off the debt. First comes a young couple who have been in arrears for many months, and the husband claims to be blacklisted for participating in the demonstration and cannot be employed. After Ye Mu made up his mind to expel them by force, he discovered that they were originally "renters". The next couple of tenants came to the island and were very proud, paid for the addition of a bath to the leaf room (the old Japanese house may not have a bathroom, the bath will go to the bath), and also borrowed 200,000 yuan to the leaf room, so that he can pay back to the big brother. However, the island, which claimed to be a foreign commentator, turned out to be an insurance broker who had lost public funds.
When Yamada learned of the opportunity to make a SP, he told Nomura that he wanted to make a family comedy, and Nomura took out the novel and called Itachi, which was written by Nomura and Yamada. Because the audience is not attracted to the novella, it is difficult to use the box office as an indicator of sp success, and film critics may not pay attention to them, mainly because shochiku determines the success or failure of the work. Although some newspapers praised "Strangers on the Second Floor" as not a newcomer's work, Shochiku was disappointed with the film. Looking back, Yamada regrets that he did not dare to shoot at that time.
Compared with Oshima's Shochiku works, "Strangers on the Second Floor" is full of many plots that follow the rules and are satisfied with the current state of society. A year ago Oshima was still singing the praises of security protesters, and a year later, Yamada's protesters (assuming he is real) are lazy and lazy scoundrels who live in the Overlord House. Ye Mu room lives a stable white-collar life, and the family has its own home. In the twenty-sixth episode of "The Suffering of Men", the blue-collar Abo and Ah Ying moved from renting an apartment to a self-owned independent house.
Hamuro made a promise to the minister, the first scene of the film rained heavily, he lent the umbrella to the minister, but did not know that his wife had borrowed one for the tenant, to walk home with his wife in the rain, the minister also forgot to return. In addition, the minister asked Ye Mu to "confess", so that the minister's wife did not know that her husband had gone to the fool. This happened, and Ye Muro still did not have a feeling of disgust or rebellion towards the minister. At the end of the film, Mrs. Ye Mu wanted to ask the minister to borrow money to return to Laidao, the minister made a sexual suggestion, Mrs. Ye Muro refused, and when she went home to her husband to talk to her husband, he was caught by the minister again to "confess".
Or take a speculative novel as a comedy is doomed to failure, light and nervous, some of the dialogue is originally funny, but it is not humorous and timely. Compared with the comedies before Yamada's "The Suffering of Men", "Strangers on the Second Floor" lacks competent comedians, but SP would not have had a first-class cast, and SP will not only be a test for new directors, but also use new actors, such as Kyoko Aoi, who plays Mrs. Hamuro, to play the main role in this film for the first time.
Tadao Sato, a film critic who has been major Shimanagi and Yoji Kayamada for many years, sees "Strangers on the Second Floor" as a reaction to the New Wave of Shochiku. Although "Street of Love and Hope" was well received at the time, Shiro Jodo regarded it as a "tendency film" that he hated, that is, a "left-leaning film". "The Stranger on the Second Floor" is in line with the warmth and optimism of the "Big Ship Tune", even though this first work was a setback for Yamada, but Yamada went all the way in the 1960s, intentionally and unintentionally, and gradually realized Johto Shiro's wish to revive the "Big Ship Wind".
| bibliography
Yoji Yamada, Making a Movie, Otsuki Yingzha, 1977 (Taikomoto, The Shadowy Man, Akiaki Ying,Shin-Chen Cultural, 2016)
Ritsu Kiritsu, Yoji Yamada's World, Chikuma Shinki, 2006
Yoji Yamada Chronicle: From "Two Strangers" to "Hidden Swords: Oni no Nails", Pia, 2005
Tadao Sato, Minna no Tora-san: The World of "Otoko wa Tsuraiyo", Asahi Bunki, 1992
Sato Tadao, The World of Nagisa Dae, Asahi Bunki, 1987
< h1 toutiao-origin="h3" > correlated</h1>
Hong Kong film critic and classical music critic, director of the Hong Kong Film Critics Society, whose columns appear in the Letter and The Ta Kung Pao.
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