When Ken Takakura died, the news from The United Press agency flew to my mobile phone screen at noon on November 18, 2014, a week after his actual death. After a moment of consternation and confusion, an image came to my mind: the pub that was behind the times that he sang in his own song hung up a sign closing after a week of closure.
◎ Sun Xiaoning
"The Tavern Behind the Times" is the ending song of "Shoji's Tavern", I don't know if it is his first screen song, but the taste of loneliness and low groaning is indeed the unique atmosphere of Ken Takakura, whom I love. In this tavern, he treats people with sincerity and watches sentient beings come and go. And we are looking at him, watching him retreat in love, and tangling and secretly searching in love. Asked why he broke up with his first love, Sarde, he said: "At that time we were both poor and we lost to poverty. Because of the two people who love each other, as long as one can get happiness, and the Kamiya family is a family..." This breakup logic was dismissed as strange by the police. He replied: "It's strange, it feels strange in this era, but at that time, I just wanted to live a stable life." ”
On the screen, Shōji was a former star baseball player who was later promoted to chief of the general affairs section, but he resigned and became a tavern owner in middle age. Why did he resign, he said: "Let me say to the colleagues who worked together yesterday that you will not come tomorrow, I can't say this." "Every choice this man's life seems to be behind the times, but it has turned a Tavern of Shōji into a warm place like a late-night canteen."
Yesterday was almost the peak of the commemoration of Ken Takakura, and the titles on the screen were all cold-faced tough guys. And this is obviously the impression that "The Hunt" is too deeply rooted in people's hearts, and people really see his film is not much to get. For someone like me who sees his film discs and collects them, his screen impression is actually closer to the image in "The Tavern of Shōji": lonely, tangled and tenacious, seemingly out of tune with the times, but can touch people's hearts in any era.
Needless to say, it is well known that Ken Takakura had only one marriage, and he died in the middle of the way. The entanglement is also related to this marriage, he married a singer's wife, after the divorce, the other party has never come out of the shadow of the marriage, and finally died of depression. This is like a drama life, the guilt inside, he can use the drama to repay. Therefore, his on-screen wives really have several, and their identities are singers. Noboriko Kato, who wrote the lyrics of "The Tavern Behind the Times", is one of them, as is Hiroko Tanaka in "To Dear You". She also collaborated with him on a night fork (1985), in which Ken Takakura was still middle-aged, dressed in tendon flesh, a standard inverted triangle figure, tattooed with a night fork pattern on his back to his chest, and a man who had escaped from the underworld and lived a peaceful life in anonymity to the seaside. Hiroko Tanaka came here from Osaka and opened a tavern called Hotaru, but was turned into a drug dealer by Takeshi Kitano's lover. Ken Takakura and the petite Yuko Tanaka have a secret affection, and Ken Takakura also contributed to the few kiss scenes on the screen. This is also a character whose emotions struggle between his wife and lover, and if there is a tangle, there must be.
The bigger entanglement was in the earlier "Station" (1967), which was a rivalry between him and chieko, who later collaborated on "Happy Yellow Handkerchief". Ken Takakura plays a divorced policeman and a tavern lady who feels sorry for each other and warms up to each other. However, during the investigation, he found that Bei's former lover was a fugitive wanted man. By this time, He had already called to report his lover, but when Ken Takakura went to her house, he saw that the person was hiding there. He raised his gun and killed the other party, and you can imagine how much of a tear in his heart was in the face of the pain-stricken Chieko. This film is very old-fashioned now, but there is still a line that I remember deeply, and it is the police who are asking Chieko: Since you reported him, why do you want to hide him, which is unreasonable. Doubly said: "It is unreasonable, but the man and woman thing, that's it." ”
What a man and a woman thing! Can't this also be explained, in "The Tavern of Mega-chi", Shōji and his lover are obviously very affectionate but want to break up? "As long as you're better off than me." This is obviously behind the emotional logic of the times, but in this film it is so sincere and credible, it is still the charm of the actor himself.
From the perspective of cooperation, directors Yasuo and Ken Takakura are a perfect match. Whether it is the early "Station" or the final "To Dear You", Yasuo who lowered the flag is the one who understands him best. The famous director Uchida Tumeng also used Ken Takakura, but a police character in "Hungry Straits" can only be regarded as playing soy sauce. As for the swordsman Sasaki Kojiro in the costume of Miyamoto Musashi, I can only say that Ken Takakura has the heroism of this character, but he does not have the youthful madness and dove on him, which is really inconsistent with temperament. But fortunately, other directors have accurately glimpsed the apologetic side of his heart. Shiro Moriya's Hakkodayama gave him the role of Captain Tokushima. The most shocking thing about this film is the cold and steep natural landscape, and Ken Takakura's face as an actor is more hidden in the hat decoration that resists the cold. But I could still read the guilt in his few close-up eyes, which he had witnessed, and so many young soldiers had to die for this tragic military operation. Zang Yuanweishan's "Antarctic Story", the most soul-grabbing scene, is actually thrown at the Antarctic and must survive on their own. I cried a lot for them, and if there was no Takakura Ken's play to balance it, I would feel ashamed of these loyal dogs. It is still Ken Takakura, with his just right performance, interpreting the uneasiness of people having to make this choice, and his return to Antarctica is like redemption for mankind.
Why a person always looks so deeply sorry, this is really a burden for good people who live very really. Ken Takakura's seriousness about the world can also be felt in his collection of essays on "Penguins of Antarctica". Here he also confessed that he had gone to Mount Hiei for some unbearable thing and was baptized by the waterfall and the top. I think that's what Ken Takakura did for his life. Japanese filmmakers have done a great job, and they all have such an obsession with treating art as a religion, but what Ken Takakura has done should be more than that. If you look at the kind of asceticism that he wrote about the monks of Mount Hiei that lasted twelve years, it can be said that the details are revealed, as if they were experienced by themselves. After completing this deep mountain journey, he had to "enter the church" to recite for several days, and Takakura Ken had both respect and worry in his pen, and it was like putting himself in the middle of it. He's actually taking this to himself.
"Pick up the spirits and do a good job." Isn't this the last scene of "Megaji's Tavern", after knowing that his lover Sha Dai is dead, he is full of tears, and he says to the window glass? He did work until he was in his eighties.
Now it seems that 2012's "To Dear You" is his perfect curtain call. In the film, he earnestly fulfills his promise to send his wife away, and now he is also joining the ranks of the long journey. I saw a message this morning that he had left peacefully in the hospital and had deliberately hoped not to be known. I would like to believe that this is a reality, and it does fit my understanding of Ken Takakura. "There will be unforgettable joy in life. The joy of meeting someone you love unexpectedly, even if you turn into white bones, you don't want to part with them. There will also be deep grief in life. There will come a day when there will be sorrow for the separation from the beloved. These are all things he said in that book, and of course he has experienced them through the screen.
Looking back, many of his films are actually related to taverns. Just look at it as his life experience field, see it all, think about it, and then it can close. It was like he had stepped out of his role as a station railroad who was about to be abandoned.
I hope all his efforts are enough to free him from those apologies. Hadn't he always expected his mother's praise? I think on that side, his mother, must also be smiling at him.