The Crucified Lovers (Chikamatsu monogatari) (Directors Suite) (1954)

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General		Extras
Category	Drama	Teaser Trailer Theatrical Trailer Trailer-Four Directors Suite trailers Booklet-insert article by Dr. Mats Karlsson, University of Sydney.
Rating
Year Of Production	1954
Running Time	97:40 (Case: 102)
RSDL / Flipper	RSDL (64:03)	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Ads Then Menu
Region Coding	4	Directed By	Kenji Mizoguchi
Studio Distributor	Madman Entertainment	Starring	Kazuo Hasegawa Kyôko Kagawa Eitarô Shindô Eitarô Ozawa Yôko Minamida Haruo Tanaka Chieko Naniwa Ichirô Sugai Tatsuya Ishiguro Hiroshi Mizuno Hisao Toake Ikkei Tamaki Kimiko Tachebana
Case	Amaray-Transparent
RPI	$34.95	Music	Fumio Hayasaka Tamezô Mochizuki

     In his Forgotten Classics of Yesteryear blog-site, Nathaniel Hood summarises The Crucified Lovers in a perfect, heartfelt way, emphasising the need to make this lesser Mizoguchi film known. He writes, "One morning in Kyoto (the former capital of Japan) during the early Edo period, a sombre procession makes its way down the main streets. People crowd into streetsides, doors, and windows to grab a peek at the main attraction of the parade. They watch as a horse walks by with two people, a man and a woman, tied back-to-back on top. They have been found guilty of adultery. Their punishment is crucifixion, for adultery is a capital offense under the Tokugawa shoguns. But first, they must be revealed to the public and shamed before they are executed. And so the stream of people continues until it exits the town and arrives at the execution grounds. One of the many people watching this display is a rich scroll-maker named Ishun. 'How dreadful women are,' Ishun mutters when the pair of condemned are paraded down the street. He shakes his head and continues, 'If a samurai does not punish the adulterer himself, he loses his rank and title.' The woman accompanying him says 'Better to die by the hand of one's husband than to perish so shamefully!' But she has been ignored. Ishun has already moved on and left her behind. This callous act sets the stage for one of Kenji Mizoguchi's last films, Chikamatsu monogatari, which literally translates to A Story From Chikamatsu. But its Western title, The Crucified Lovers, seems more appropriate considering it begins with two lovers being crucified and it ends the same way. What we as an audience will witness between these two events is a story of tragic love and harsh social injustice.

     It all starts with a misunderstanding. Ishun's wife, Osan, is from an impoverished family. One day, her brother asks her for a loan to make a payment on their ancestral home's interest. Ishun is notorious for being stingy. So Osan asks one of his top assistants, Mohei, for help. Little does she know Mohei is in love with her. So he decides to take a serious risk and forges a receipt for the money that her brother needs. But, unfortunately, he is caught. In a terrifying shot we see the outside of Ishun's office, we hear Mohei apologizing and then we see him getting thrown out by Ishun. When he lands, he quickly prostrates himself in front of him and begs for forgiveness. Osan is about to leap to his defence when suddenly a maid named O-Tama yells out that it was her fault. She claims that she had asked for the money. In reality, O-Tama is madly in love with Mohei. All she wanted to do was to protect him. But this was a bad choice on her part. Ishun has tried on several occasions to seduce her, including one early scene where he goes into her room, starts to stroke her arm underneath her kimono, and says, 'I can come in here and do what I want when I want to.' Enraged at the thought that O-Tama loves Mohei, he has him imprisoned in his attic.

     Here, the plot begins to get complicated, but I will try to summarize it as succinctly as possible. In what seems like a scene out of a French farce, there is an unfortunate bed-swapping. When Osan goes to thank O-Tama for her help, she discovers that her husband has been cheating. So, in an attempt to catch him in the act, she sleeps in O-Tama's bed. However, Mohei escapes from the attic and goes to O-Tama's room where he hopes to thank her before he tries to escape to avoid being handed over to the authorities. However, he discovers Osan in O-Tama's bed. At that exact moment, the shop clerk walks in and sees the two together. The alarm is raised and general havoc ensues. In the commotion, Mohei manages to get away. However, Osan is forced to face her husband's wrath. He gives her a dagger and tells her to do what a person of her status should do. However, instead of killing herself, she flees. As chance should have it, she runs into Mohei again. The two go on the run to Osaka. They come to realize their love for one another and swear to never be apart again. However, the authorities are looking for them, and there is nowhere to hide...

     It is difficult to give a good description of this movie's plot while doing it justice. It is no easier than if somebody told you to give a detailed summary of all five acts of Shakespeare's Hamlet in one paragraph. But that seems appropriate considering that the film is based on the play Daikyoji sekireki by Monzaemon Chikamatsu, who is called the Japanese Shakespeare. It is a deep, complicated plot that examines a wide array of human emotions. However, we find ourselves caught up in the social implications and the blatant hypocrisies of the antagonist Ishun. For that we have to thank the veteran director, Kenji Mizoguchi. No stranger to social issues (particularly ones pertaining to women's rights) Mizoguchi has established a long line of truly insidious and cruel male antagonists who use women. One of the most memorable is Mr. Asai from Osaka Elegy (1936) who forces his daughter into prostitution because 'it's his right to use his daughter as he sees fit' and then throws her out of his house when she is arrested and brings shame to his family. Just like Ishun, Mr. Asai sees women as commodities or vassals of pleasure designed only to serve men. When they become inconvenient or troublesome, they simply get rid of them. Why do these antagonists keep showing up in Mizoguchi's movies?

     The main reason would probably be that Mizoguchi had a real life experience that changed his perspective on women's rights. His father was a cruel man who made life for his mother and sister miserable. When Mizoguchi was still young, his father sold his older sister as a geisha. This trauma of seeing his sister forced into the human meat market transformed Mizoguchi and made him one of cinema's first feminist filmmakers. One can only imagine how many times he sees the face of his father in his villains and the face of his sister in his heroes. Despite his demons, he went on to become one of the greatest Japanese filmmakers of all time.

     Mizoguchi has been declared a master of the long take and mise-en-scene. One of his greatest trade marks was his 'scroll shots' where he would pan over a scene from left-to-right or right-to-left and observe the action as if we were looking at a living Japanese paint scroll. One great example of this technique is used early on in the film when Ishun enters his workshop looking for Mohei. We get three consecutive shots: one of him entering the shop, one the courtyard, and one his room. Each one starts with him entering the screen from the right and exiting the frame on the left. The three shots sweep across the set, following Ishun as he crosses.

     Despite all of his amazing talent, for a long time Mizoguchi was ignored by audiences overseas. Along with his contemporary Ozu, his films were considered too Japanese for Western audiences. However, all this began to change in the 1950s when his work began to get recognized in European Film Festivals. The Crucified Lovers was actually nominated for the Palme d'Or at the 1955 Cannes Film Festival. His later movies like Life of Oharu (1952), Ugetsu (1953), and Sansho the Bailiff (1954) received tremendous accolades and finally established Mizoguchi as one of the world's greatest filmmakers. Unfortunately, many of his films are lost or unavailable in the West. So movies like The Crucified Lovers seem doomed to fade away into obscurity. If there is any justice in the world, his movies would be saved and distributed to a wider audience. Go figure.

     Most of his films deal with injustice in one way or another. Sometimes, they end happily, but most of them end on a sad note. And indeed, The Crucified Lovers ends on a tragic note. Osan and Mohei are being paraded down a street on the way to the executioner's plot where they will be crucified for their adultery. But they seem happy. They hold hands and make defiant faces at the crowds. Even the onlookers admit that they have never seen them that happy. Maybe that is what life is about: those few, fleeting moments where we can find some form of happiness, regardless of what society wants for us. Mizoguchi worked for decades only to be acknowledged for his work in his twilight years. Osan and Mohei loved for only a few days. But those days were enough to see them heading towards their deaths with their hands intertwined and their hearts singing. May we all be so lucky..."

     I want to re-clarify the notion of this film as a 'lesser-Mizoguchi' film, as mentioned at the beginning of this plot synopsis. What I mean by this term is that it is a film that is not as well known as Mizoguchi's Venice Film Festival Award winners Life of Oharu, Ugetsu and Sansho the Bailiff. In my opinion, this is a beautifully adapted story with key Mizoguchi themes of unjust suffering, corrupt authority figures and innocent women who are dishonoured. Tony Rayns believes that Mizoguchi disliked the production of the film and was unenthusiastic about it, and as such this is therefore a lesser film in his opinion. On the contrary, The Crucified Lovers is a very important work in Kenji Mizoguchi's film career, deserving of reappraisal.

Video

     The film, shot by cinematographer Kazuo Miyagawa, looks stunning in this video transfer. The aspect ratio is 1:33:1. It is not 16x9 enhanced.

     The average bitrate of the main feature is 7.95 m/b per second, so there are no compression issues. With Mizoguchi's mise-en-scene tradition of one scene, one take, we have sharp images due to deep focus photography were sets are well-lit to bring background and foreground visuals into each scene. Contrast is distinctive in the varying details of grey in the black-and-white video transfer.

     Negative (white) film artefacts showing scratches are seen in the latter half of the movie, as is slight telecine wobble and contrast fluctuations. These faults with the transfer are uncommon, with film artefacts the main issue with the transfer.

     Subtitles are presented in a default white, with optional yellow.

     The RSDL change occurs at 64:03 during a scene transition so it s not so noticeable.

Video Ratings Summary

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Audio

     Fumio Hayasaka's soundtrack utilises traditional Japanese instrumentation such as flutes, stringed instruments and drums.

     The main soundtrack is in Japanese, encoded in Dolby Digital 2.0 at 224 kbps. Dialogue is mainly clear, however sometimes it depends on whether the characters in a scene are in the foreground or the background as to how clear the soundtrack is.

     Music is used sparingly to heighten the drama of the two lovers in their bid to escape. The soundtrack is reminiscent of Akira Kurosawa's soundtrack for his 1985 film, Ran, especially the flute work.

     There is no surround channel usage as the main soundtrack is in mono. The subwoofer is not utilised either.

Audio Ratings Summary

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Teaser Trailer (2:06)

     This teaser shows behind the scenes footage of the making of the film while promoting the film company Daiei Productions.

Theatrical Trailer (3:49)

     This trailer is as similarly unrestored as the teaser trailer. This introduces the main cast of the film.

Directors Suite trailers

     Four Directors Suite trailers are included for Akira Kurosawa's Ikiru, Yasujiro Ozu's Tokyo Story, Jia Zhang-Ke's The World and Hirokazu Kore-eda's Still Walking .

Insert article by Dr. Mats Karlsson, Lecturer in Japanese Studies, University of Sydney

     Dr. Mats Karlsson's 16-page essay is entitled, The Crucified Lovers: A Study in Unbridled Passion and that is what we get in terms of discussion of the film, a passionate discourse on the contextual background of both the original story based on a puppet play by Chikamatsu Monzaemon and a novel by Ihara Saikaku, both coming from the 17th century. Dr. Karlsson also discusses the production of the film under Daiei Studios, the lead actors, in particular Mizoguchi's disappointment with Hasegawa Kazuo, and themes such as the plight of women, suffering and honourable sacrifice.

     The Crucified Lovers has been released in Region 2 in the United Kingdom by Masters of Cinema under its traditional Japanese title, Chikamatsu monogatari. This comes in a two-disc release with Uwasa no onna. The extras include video discussions on both films by Tony Rayns which run for 12-13 minutes each, original trailers and a 56-page booklet containing an essay by Mark le Fanu on Chikamatsu monogatari, English translations of Ihara Saikaku's 1686 'What the Seasons Bought the Almanac Maker' and the opening section of Chikamatsu Monzaemon's 'The Almanac of Love', an extract from Keiko L. McDonald's long out-of-print book, Mizoguchi, looks at Uwasa no onna and states that the work is a long way from Mizoguchi at his best.

     In my opinion, the video discussions by Tony Rayns and the booklet, together with the inclusion of Uwasa no onna, makes the Region 2 Masters of Cinema release the best available on DVD.

    Unjust authority figures, innocent women who suffer, hallway tracking shots, long takes, even mist and water shots are all prevalent in this adaption by Kenji Mizoguchi to honour Monzaemon Chikamatsu, the 'Japanese Shakespeare'. The Crucified Lovers is a Mizoguchi feature you'll find that you will play again in your Home Theatre system in the near future. I know that I will!

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