"Il Posto" - Ermanno Olmi (1961)

Ermanno Olmi started as an industrial filmmaker before launching his career in feature films, and he has always continued to use the raw materials of documentary film production: non-professional actors and the natural settings and environment of the everyday world. As a consequence, his work has often been viewed in the light of Italian Neorealism, even though it was always going to be difficult to confine Neorealism’s early adherents within its somewhat problematic conceptual boundaries. In fact by the time Olmi came onto the scene in the late 1950s, Neorealism’s patriarchs, such as Roberto Rosellini, Luchino Visconti, and Vittorio de Sica, had moved off in very different directions, and the “movement” had lost its steam. But it was to be revived with Olmi’s second feature, Il Posto, (The Job, aka The Sound of the Trumpets, 1961), which seemed to breathe new life into the Neorealistic attitude (and it is sustained today by the work of some Iranian filmmakers, notably Jafar Panahi). (Note: for further discussion on Italian Neorealism, see "Aesthetics of Two Neorealist Films: Open City and Paisan" and "Subjective Realism in the Italian Film".)

But Olmi’s Il Posto is much more than just a Neorealist film. Like de Sica’s Bicycle Thieves (1948), Olmi’s Il Posto transcends the dimensions of Neorealism and stands as one of the great and universal films of any era. Indeed, it is fitting, then, that Olmi cites de Sica as an important influence on his work. There are several factors that contribute to the virtues of Il Posto – the cinematic craftsmanship, the affecting and natural acting, and the compelling narrative, itself, which is not just about particular people at a particular time, but about the very nature of modern life.

The story of the film is set in postwar Milan, but it concerns the disruptive changes that were altering life all over the world after the war. The war itself, of course, was cataclysmic and disruptive, but with peacetime, large-scale capitalism was spreading around the globe and leading to vast changes in the way people live and socialise. We are still living in the middle of this disruptive evolutionary cultural process of “globalization”, which is a new term for something that got into full gear after the end of the Second World War. Our culture and our attitudes are still catching up to the impact and consequences that global capitalisation (perhaps more effectively termed “Predatory Capitalism” – see the current work of economist James K. Galbraith) is engendering. There are four main narrative sections to the story, none of which fully come to closure and leave the viewer at the end with a thoughtful feeling of openness and missed opportunities.

1. Romance.
The first section, of about 34 minute, depicts the hopes and uncertainties of Domenico, a 19-year-old boy from a working-class family who has left “middle school” and is looking for his first job. He takes the train to the big city, Milan, hoping to get an office job at a large company, which if he gets it, his family assures him, will provide him secure employment “for life”. But Domenico, like all young boys, is not really prepared for the workaday world of employment, and doesn’t really know what to expect. He is sensitive and watchful, trying to make a good impression, without know what he really wants – or even what he should want.

When he arrives at the company, he and a large number of other applicants are asked to take various aptitude and personality tests which will be used to determine who gets a job offer. During the lunch break, Domenico meets a pretty young fellow applicant, Atonietta, and they strike up a friendly conversation. Clearly Domenico is very attracted to the lovely girl, but he is naturally shy – a trait that seems to appeal to the girl. Since they have some time before they must return, they go window-shopping in the city. On the way back to the office, they realise that they are late, and they start to run through the streets to get back on time. Domenico takes Antonietta’s hand to help her steer through the chaotic traffic, and soon their hand-holding is delicately portrayed for what it is – an affectionate gesture between the tentative youngsters in search of romance.

After they complete the rest of the “application” day at the company, Domenico meets Antonietta again, and he walks her to her bus stop, and their beautiful tryst ends. The day of uncertainty has ended full of excitement and high hopes.

2. Introduction to the Work World.
Soon it is clear that Domenico has been offered a job by the company. He is outfitted with a new coat and sent off to the train to report for his first day. Not long after he arrives, he happily learns that Antonietta has been offered a job, too. But Domenico is assigned to work in a building different from Antonietta’s, as an assistant office messenger until a desk job opens up. It is soon clear that there is almost nothing for the two office messengers in that building to do, so they just sit at their desks in the corridor outside an office room, whiling away the time. Even when they are assigned to deliver a message, his senior partner, Sartori, advises him cynically not to hurry – make them wait. This section lasts about 18 minutes and shows the intimidating and confusing nature of his new company and position.

3. Isolated, Meaningless Work.
This third section depicts life inside the office room close to Domenico’s desk. There are two rows – four desks in a row – with individuals apparently doing utterly boring, meaningless paperwork. All of these office workers are introduced: the poorly-sighted “Sleepyhead”, the loud worker, the cigarette smoker, the quiet matron, the mother of some grown-up boys, etc. This is then followed by a series of dissolves that move from one vignette to another depicting the squalid circumstances of these people in their private lives. They are all isolated and essentially lonely, cut off from the kind of genuine companionship and interaction that we would find worthwhile. When we cut back to Sartori and Domenico (the next day?), they observe a former office worker who has been retired for three months, but who comes to the office every day and sits in a chair, doing nothing. The man apparently has nothing else to do.

After work, Domenico waits in the rain for Antonietta, but he sees her leave in the company with a number of people, including a well-dressed young man who is holding an umbrella for her. So Domenico watches them depart in silence.

4. Empty Socialising.
Domenico finally runs into Antonietta one day at work, and she asks him to come to the company New Year’s Eve Dance. Domenico does manage to come and finds himself in a large lineoleum-floored room full of tables in front of a bandstand. The room gradually fills with company workers, but Antonietta never shows up. Instead, we watch people engaging in artificial and empty socialising, with little motivation other than to become inebriated. They do become convivial, but it seems garish and forced. These are people that are to be Domenico’s comrades “for life”.

The next day at the office, the office workers are shown standing mournfully around Sleepyhead’s desk. He has passed away, and now Domenico has been assigned his desk. The film ends with Domenico having joined the ranks of the “desks in a row” group, sitting in the rear and commencing his task of boring, meaningless paperwork.

What makes Il Posto poignant is the way it shows how the sincere and innocent Domenico is led relentlessly into the depressing jaws of mind-numbing corporate mechanics. He, too, seems to be doomed to a life of empty, seemingly pointless activity, with little opportunity for meaningful interaction or engagement. Domenico and Antonietta never make the real connection, and presumably that romantic opportunity is lost. Domenico is overwhelmed by the sheer inertia of implacable company minutia. And yet, the entire narrative is presented with a certain good-natured resignation. It is this irony which makes the film stand out. Domenico is like us. He tries to make his way as best he can, and to a certain extent he succeeds. But the rattling noise of the mimeograph machine which grows louder and louder at the close of the film reminds us of what Domenico must feel: there has to be something more than this.

The acting in the film is exceptional throughout. Most of the actors never appeared in any other films. The story probably reflects some of Olmi’s experiences when he worked as an office worker. But on that occasion, at least, he didn’t let his opportunities pass away -- he married actress Loredana Detto, who plays the beautiful Antonietta.

The camera work is also outstanding. Olmi essentially shoots the films he makes, himself, which distinguishes him from other filmmakers. He sees himself more as a craftsman than as an intellectual. It was interesting to me that in an interview, Olmi mentioned that, by contrast, Fellini, whose visual sensibility I admire, never, ever looks through the viewfinder of the camera. One fine example of fluid and unobtrusive camerawork is a 75-second tracking shot in the first section, showing Domenico and Antonietta walking together after their testing day. It is beautifully and delicately shot, as the two of them seem not to know what to do with their hands, after their hand-holding experience earlier in the day. The scenes of the office and of the industrial construction site capture, in a natural way, a mood of relentless and overwhelming mechanics. What is particularly adroit is the way Olmi manages the tempo of the scenes in just the right way, with various extended pauses, cutaways, and point-of-view shots showing Domenico’s reactions to the bewildering world of corporate life.

All told, the four sequences of Il Posto, with their sense of openness and of expectation, leave us with a sense of questioning. It is the same look of questioning that we saw and understood on the face of James Dean in some of his films. Even though we cannot articulate it, there is something that we, too, felt with Domenico when he was with Antonietta – something we must not lose track of, something important, something beautiful out there.
★★★★

Subjective Realism in the Italian Film

In two early films by Roberto Rossellini, Open City (Roma, Città Aperta,1945) and Paisan (Paisà, 1946), there were remarkable sequences of relatively unanalyzed events whose harshness and direct impact seemed to possess an extra measure of the present tense. The aesthetic vigor of these sequences precluded the possibility of presenting subjective reality, the world seen from a point of view. Rossellini’s Italian confreres who have elected to present an authentic subjective reality have had to employ an artistic selectivity that has led them in different and interesting directions. Three films which purport to be, in some sense, documents of the human condition, yet which embody different aesthetic principles, are La Terra Trema (Terra Trema: Episodio del Mare, 1948), Umberto D. (1955), and Il Posto (1961).

Visconti’s La Terra Trema, does not, as do the two other listed films, present a point of view of a single participant of the action, but it does present a point of view from outside its theater of action. There is a narrator who places the scene by announcing such things as the fact that the Sicilian fishermen bring their catch back to the wholesalers who “buy for nothing the fish they have caught with such pain.” When the characters themselves take over the dramatic action, there is still an omnipresent sense of moral judgement that pervades the atmosphere. The extent to which one can accept the present point of view as realistic is in a large sense the extent to which one is in sympathy with the film’s underlying Marxist analysis of society.

But putting such considerations aside for the moment, it is still reasonable to assert that any film that is a worthwhile statement presents a certain amount of interpretation and analysis of reality and that this analysis is more forceful the more closely it is allied with its medium of reality. One of the grounds for divergence among the so-called realist filmmakers is a gneral disagreement as to what kind of reality (psychological, social, physical, etc.) is most fundamental. La Terra Trema is then an attempt to depict social reality in terms of the Marxist orientation. To that end Visconti made some radical aesthetic decisions that distinguished the film from its contemporaries. The degree to which Visconti was able to immerse his vision in external reality, however, is a matter open to considerable question.

The fishermen portrayed in the film are fishermen in real life who were recruited at the scene of the story’s location. The intent was to have characters who would be organically a part of the environment that was to be filmed and thus to have action emerge in a completely spontaneous way. Visconti even let these non-professionals write their own dialogue so that they could express themselves in their own words. The fact that they did write their own lines, however, points to one of the difficulties of the film. Far from being filmed in a spontaneous situation, these fishermen were compelled to act within the rigid structure of a melodramatic plot line. In this connection we add that in order to perform successfully in a dramatic production, an important attribute for an actor to possess is a vigorous imagination. It is unlikely that Sicilian fishermen who have never left their village would be skilled in this regard. Thus the fishermen are unlikely to be able to “flesh out” any performance of a scene in which the action was not one of total spontaneity. The result in La Terra Trema was acting that was frequently uneven.

The evident unevenness of the film was made even more conspicuous by other aesthetic choices of Visconti. The photography in the film featured some of the first successful deep-focus scenes shot on location and in typical weather conditions. With much of the set in focus, Visconti eschewed classical montage and held shots for sometimes as long as several minutes in order to preserve their psychological integrity. This only emphasized the amateurish nature of the acting in several dull scenes. Moreover, deep-focus photography that neglects montage must be played out in real time. Such a technique is difficult to integrate with a melodramatic plot. Renoir was able to do it in Le Grande Illusion (1937) by the adroit use of elliptical action. Visconti, however, plays everyting out and thus undercuts his own plot dynamics by stretching out the film’s length to over three hours.

The comparison of Visconti to Renoir reveals other significant differences. Renoir has said that he preferred mise-en-scène in depth so that he could more freely move about his characters. That is, his camera was made more flexible and accommodating to the action. To avoid the “posed” shot, Renoir not only composed shots in depth, but made his characters move within the shot and employed elegant panning, tilting, and tracking shots to follows the action. Visconti, on the other hand, does not employ any tracking shots, and most of his shots (which, as was mentioned, are of long duration) are fixed frame – characters enter the frame and take up a position. The effect is just what Renoir avoided – the posed shot. Visconti does use some camera pans, but they do not follow action, nor do they contribute to a sense of screen kinetics. Instead they have the effect of an aesthetic exploration. This static use of the camera gives La Terra Trema a stagy aura, despite some excellent photography of the authentic locations achieved within the self-imposed limitations.

The point to be made is not that La Terra Trema is awful (though it ihas been vastly overpraised), but that aesthetic decisions made by Visconti, for which he has been frequently commended, served to undercut the impact of the film. One is left with a sense of static pictorialism after viewing the film. It is as though critics feel that Visconti deserves to be praised for arriving at visual aestheticism “with one had tied behind his back”. Much preferable to such a scheme is Robert Flaherty’s Man of Aran (1934), in which aestheticism was more consciously targeted and more successfully achieved.

The plot of La Terra Trema, independent of the mise-en-scène, is not a strong point, either. Not only are the members of the family made out bo be strangely heroic, but then they are shown to be subject to amazing lapses of foresight. As Dwight MacDonald has pointed out

Why, for example, does the proletarian hero take his fishing boat, which he has acquired by mortgaging his home in order to be independent of the wholesaler, out in a storm when no other boats venture forth? The commentary says it is because he is poor and cannot afford a day’s idleness, but this is nonsense, since he could even less afford to wreck his boat, which he does.

Had Visconti made more appropriate decisions for the proper expression of his message, his film probably would have not been very distinctive at all; it probably would have resembled one of the American social realist films of the Thirties.

In terms of documenting the human condition, Umberto D. and Il Posto are more successful. Umberto D. Presents a collection of events in an old man’s life, most of which contribute to his sense of uselessness and isolation. He finally decides to put an end to his life. However, at the film’s end he realizes in a stroke that his feelings for his little dog outweigh all the reasons he had been able to muster on behalf of his suicide. The subjective point of view here is the old man (and to a lesser extent a pregnant housemaid who lives next to him). The effort is to present everyday happenstances in all their detail (though still dramatically constructed) so as to reveal the consciousness. To a large extent this is successful; the old man does not philosophize about his existence. Instead he progresses to his morose contemplation of self-destruction by living out a succession of mundane experiences.

Il Posto presents a disarmingly conventional theme: a young man gets a job in the big city. The subjective point of view is more sophisticated and forceful than in Umberto D. While Umberto D. does present events dramatically arranged and selected, they are nevertheless “objectively” presented. Il Posto, in contrast, presents a succession of key moments in the life of the boy that have an affective mise-en-scène despite exceptionally objective acting and event-structure. Unlike the previously discussed films, however, Il Posto presents an evolving consciousness that is expressed in terms of the quasi-subjective cinematography. As the boy is gradually absorbed into the corporate existence, he continually adapts to it, not with conscious pleasure or displeasure but simply as a matter of course. It is the only way open. In Umberto D. there seems to be a blind faith that if all the mundane details of the old man’s life are presented, we will be able to understand his condition. Thus, though an event may be dramatically chosen, the details of that event are all presented without regard to their relative importance. Il Posto, however, manages to bring out events which are much more banal than those in Umberto D., yet which seem more significant due to the subjective progression of the story. The psychological distance between the young boy in ll Posto and the audience is much smaller than that between the old man and the audience in Umberto D.. The blend of documentary style events with subjective cinematography in Il Posto represents a unique middle ground between the Neorealist films and the more conventional narrative films of Europe. It also shows the way to get out of the stylistic dead-end that presented itself to many of the early realist enthusiasts.

[See also “Aesthetics of Two Neorealist Films: 'Open City' and 'Paisan'”]

Carl Theodor Dreyer

Films of Carl Theodor Dreyer:

• The Passion of Joan of Arc - Carl Dreyer (1928)
• Vampyr - Carl Dreyer (1932)
• Day of Wrath - Carl Dreyer (1943)
• Ordet - Carl Dreyer (1955) 
• Gertrud - Carl Dreyer (1964)

"The Passion of Joan of Arc" - Carl Dreyer (1928)

Danish filmmaker, Carl Theodore Dreyer, Jr. (1889-1968), has a unique place in film history. Although he had limited schooling, he was an intellectual. Although he had a long career in the Danish film industry, he directed few films. A meticulous craftsmand and taskmaster, each of his completed films seem to be unique and difficult to categorize. His most famous film, and one that is often cited among the all-time great films, was The Passion of Joan of Arc (La Passion de Jeanne d'Arc, 1928). It is a silent film, one of the last of the silent era, depicting the Inquisitional trial and execution of Joan, the Maid of Orleans, after she was captured by the English army in 1431. Though made in France and standing as a celebration of the French “national legend”, the film was a truly international collaboration: director Dreyer was Danish, star actress Falconetti was Corsican, cameraman Rudolph Maté (who would later direct the film noir classic, D.O.A.) was Polish, and art director Hermann Warm (famous for The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari) was German. France was not highly regarded for movie production in those days – Richard Watts, Jr., commented in the New York Herald Tribune in 1929 that “most of its [French] films have been almost unbelievably incompetent”, but he added that now with Dreyer’s film, “the French cinema art is born" [1]. (Note that my comments here apply to the restored 82-minute version of the film that was reconstructed in 1985. I have seen earlier, mangled prints of the The Passion of Joan of Arc, and they are definitely not worth seeing.)

Paul Schrader famously classified Dreyer, along with Yasujiro Ozu and Robert Bresson, as a “transcendental filmmaker”, and The Passion of Joan of Arc was certainly one of the most transcendental films. So much has been written about the real Joan of Arc that there is little point in adding anything here, other than to quote Stephen W. Richey’s comment:

Joan of Arc -- the seventeen-year-old peasant girl, who, as she said herself, "did not know ‘A’ from ‘B’," but who, in a year and a month, crowned a reluctant king, rallied a broken people, reversed the course of a great war, and shoved history into a new path --what are we to make of her? The people who came after her in the five centuries since her death tried to make everything of her: demonic fanatic, spiritual mystic, naive and tragically ill-used tool of the powerful, creator and icon of modern popular nationalism, adored heroine, saint. She insisted, even when threatened with torture and faced with death by fire, that she was guided by voices from God. Voices or no voices, her achievements leave anyone who knows her story shaking his head in amazed wonder.

Dreyer’s film does not cover the dramatic events that led this pious young girl (a) to approach the beleaguered French military leaders with an offer to lead them in battle, and then (b) to inspire a string of amazing victories over the Engolish on the battlefield. Instead, it focuses on the ecclesiastical trial that led to her condemnation, taking advantage of authentic transcripts of the trial that had come to light only in 1924. It tells how a young, unsophisticated and illiterate girl was confronted by powerful and learned judges of the Church who held life-and-death sway over her fate. All she had on her side was the firm conviction of her faith in God and in her own intense spiritual experiences.

Although it may sound from this description like the film would be a talky and boring coverage of the court hearing, this is not the case. The narrative moves forward through several structured sequences, carried along swiftly by Dreyer’s dynamic editing.

Sequence 1. In the first part, the judges try to trap Joan into confessing to blasphemous thoughts and actions, thereby proving that her visions couldn’t be associated with an omnipotent God. Some of the recorded interactions with the judges reveal both the subtlety of her intuitive responses and the degree to which they related almost to a different plane of thought and existence from that of the judges. While the ecclesiastical authorities are asking her things like how she could intellectually distinguish between a true messenger of God and Satan, Joan is indicating a conviction that goes beyond intellectual judgment. Consider these interactions:

Questioners: “You have said that St. Michael appeared to you. . . in what form? Did he wear a crown?” (Joan hesitates) “How was he dressed? How did you know if it was a man or a woman? Was he naked?”

Joan: “Do you think God was unable to clothe him?”

Questioners: “Did he have long hair?”

Joan: “Why would he have cut it?”

(Later on)

Questioners: “Are you in a state of grace?”

Joan: “If I am, may God keep me there. If I am not, may God grant it to me.”

Sequence 2. In the next part, still less than halfway through the film, the judges realise that they are not making progress with their questioning. Even their "good-cop/bad-cop" routine hasn't worked. They decide to threaten Joan with torture. Weakened from ill-treatment and bloodletting, she agrees to abjure and confesses that her visions were false and that she had been misled by Satan. This section lasts about 24 minutes.

Sequence 3. In the final part Joan recovers herself from her frailty and recants her abjuration. She is immediately condemned to be burned at the stake. Even the haughty judges are now tearfully begging her to stick with her original abjuration, but Joan, summoning up her courage to tell the truth as she knows it, says that her recantation was a lie: the holy visions were real to her. She is burned at the stake, after which the peasant witnesses riot and are then ruthlessly bludgeoned and overrun by the English soldiers from the fortress.

Dreyer’s cinematic approach in The Passion of Joan of Arc was extraordinarily unusual for its day, and is still strikingly unlike most films today. The film moves along at a brisk pace, with rapid cutting back and forth between the various faces of the participants: the haughty and domineering judges, and the desperately vulnerable, but steadfast, Joan. Much of the film consists of separate closeups of Joan and her Inquisitors. Dreyer did not follow plausible point-of-view camera setups for these closeups, so that the viewer is often disoriented. A high percentage of these closeups are shot from a long angle, with Joan gazing upward, above the camera line. In addition, Dreyer rarely used scene establishing shots, cuts on action, or separation-resolution shots. As a result with all these separate cuts, it is difficult to ascertain where everyone is situated in the courtroom. It is reported that when Dreyer began production, he had an elaborate single set constructed prior to shooting. He then shot the script entirely in sequence. However, as he shot the film, he apparently became more and more obsessed with getting the authentic emotional performances and images in his closeups. When the film was edited, his priority was emotional authenticity over narrative and visual continuity.

When I began watching the film, I was distracted by the artificiality of the relentless, seemingly random, cutting back and forth between apparently exaggerated emotional closeups. But after fifteen minutes or so, I clicked into the brilliant rhythm of the film. It takes on a visual life of its own and sweeps the viewer along like a flamenco musical piece. It becomes a delirious lyrical masterpiece that pushes the boundaries of cinematic expression far beyond verbal explication. In particular, the film offers a new variation on expressionism. Dreyer was an expressionist, and the set he designed, presumably with the assistance of Hermann Warm, was highly expressionistic along the lines of German Expressionistic visual art. But the constructed set is barely noticeable in this film, as Dreyer pushed on to new dimensions of expressionism by focusing on the visual expressiveness of the human face. It was Dreyer who once wrote that architecture was the highest art – even higher than cinema. The reason for his view was that an architect builds a structure that contains and hosts human existence in an intimate way, whereas other visual arts are seen from a distance. It is the artistic potential for human interactiveness that Dreyer saw as the key to architecture. Today, with location-aware wireless mutimedia offering interactive envrionments that are embedded into our daily lives, the interaction potential that Dreyer saw for architecture is being merged with cinema. But most important for us is the way we interact via the expressive power of the human face.
★★★★

Notes:

1. Watts, Richard, "A Dying Art Offers a Masterpiece", New York Herald Tribune, (31 March 1929), reprinted in Introduction to the Art of the Movies, by Lewis Jacobs, (1960), Noonday Press, New York, pp. 130-133.

"The 47 Ronin" - Kenji Mizoguchi (1941-42)

Kenji Mizoguchi was at the height of his powers by the late 1930s, as evidenced by Osaka Elegy (1936), Sisters of the Gion (1936), and The Story of the Last Chrysanthemum (1939), but at the outset of the 1940s the Japanese government’s increasing military involvements began to impose restrictions on his artistic license. Japan was already deeply involved in the brutal China-Japan War (Second Sino-Japanese War), which would kill one million Japanese soldiers and lead to more than 20 million Chinese deaths. In addition, the government was preparing for possible conflict with Russia and the United States. To provide moral support for these activities and glorify Japanese military values, the government commissioned Mizoguchi to make a film about the famous story of the “Loyal 47 Ronin”, which involved subject matter far removed from Mizoguchi’s usual social dramas. So Mizoguchi’s treatment must be examine in this historical and cultural context.

The 47 Ronin (Genroku Ako) Incident was a real historical occurrence that took place in 1701-02 during the Tokugawa shogunate (aka the Edo Period). It is sometimes referred to as Japan’s “national legend” and has a standing in Japanese culture perhaps somewhat like thath of Joan of Arc in France, or the Boston Tea Party in the United States. It might be even more appropriate, though, to compare it to the Alamo Incident in the U.S. Mexican war, because the Genroku Ako incident was not a seminal event that changed the course of history, but was more of an iconic event that went on to rally sympathies concerning heroic conduct. In the case of the Genroku Ako case, there is also the important issue of loyalty to bushido, the samurai code of honour.

The Japanese had a long history of samurai, who were the upper ranks of the warrior class. By the 12th century, the samurai followed an already highly structured, though unwritten, code, known as bushido. During the Edo period, which covered the 17th -19th centuries, there was no warfare, and the samurai became more domesticated, occupying significant positions in the bureaucracy and court. Traditional values nevertheless expected them to live by their strict code. But there was also an increasingly structured legal system set down by the shogunate, so samurai were expected to follow and live up to the demands of two codes of conduct; the government legal system and bushido.

Incidentally, samurai were by no means a tiny segment of society. They represented up to 10 percent of the adult male population during this time. To be “somebody” was to be a samurai – there was an enormous difference in honour and respect between a samurai warrior and an ordindary commoner. The highest samurai were daimyos, i.e. lords, who had territorial estates and employed a regiment of samurai as their most valued employees. According to the bushido code, these serving samurai were to have undying loyalty to their lords and masters. If a samurai were to be discharged or his master were to die, then he would become a ronin, which was a masterless samurai. To be a ronin was to be in a highly compromised position concerning one’s honour, because he would be unable to fulfil the demands that bushido had laid down. As a consequence, if a samurai became a ronin, he was unlikely to be hired and was threatened with penury.

The specific historical details of the real 47 Ronin Incident are as follows. In 1701 two younger daimyos, Lord Asano and Lord Kamei, were ordered to arrange a reception for some envoys of Emperor in Edo (Tokyo). They were to be given instruction by Lord Kira, the official Master of Ceremonies and a member of an important Edo family. For some reason, perhaps because the two younger daimyos had not given Lord Kira a suitable bribe, Kira began abusing them in public, causing them to lose face. Lord Kamei somehow managed to mollify Lord Kira (perhaps with a suitable bribe), so Kira turned his abuse exclusively on Lord Asano. Eventually Lord Asano lost control and physically attacked Lord Kira with a dagger inside the shogun’s residence. But Kira was only wounded by the first thrust, and the two were quickly separated by palace guards. Asano was taken into custody and a judgement from the shogunate was rendered against him for his offence on palace grounds: he was to commit suicide (hara kiri, or seppuku) as punishment, his daimyo estate was to be disestablished, his family ruined, and his samurai retainers were to be made ronin.

Of Asano’s three hundred or so samurai, forty-seven of them banded together under their leader, chamberlain Oishi, and swore to avenge Asano’s humiliation and death. They intended to kill Lord Kira, even if it cost them their own lives. By doing so, they would live up to the bushido code. But, of course, Kira was suspicious and surrounded himself with armed guards. So Oishi and his men plotted to lie low for some time until they had the right opportunity. In order to deflect suspicion, Oishi began acting like a drunkard and others of his men went underground. Finally, after almost two years, the loyal ronin reassembled in Edo and staged an attack on Kira’s residence. In the onslaught, Kira and sixteen of his men were killed, with another twenty-two men wounded. The men then decapitated Kira and took his head to Lord Asano’s grave, where they presented it as an offering to satisfy their deceased lord’s requirements for revenge. Then Oishi and his men turned themselves into the authorities. Clearly Oishi and his men had broken the law, but they had, according to the community, satisfied the demands of bushido. The shogunate officials took almost two months to come to their verdict, which was that Oishi and his men must also die by committing seppuku.

The tombs of Oishi’s ronin soon became a sight of great veneration, and not long afterwards there were stories, poems, and plays composed honouring these “heroes”. Slightly fictionalised versions of the story were entitled “Chushingura”, and over the years there have been more than twenty Japanese films and many televison features depicting the story. So when anyone else filmed the story, he was expected not to deviate much from the real historical events.

The 47 Ronin story has captured the Japanese imagination like nothing else, and it is worthwhile reflecting on the reasons for this. The principal story themes are honour (in particular, maintaining face), personal sacrifice, and revenge.

• Face. For many people in the West, honour is not just having the respect of one's peers, but of being honourable – being truly worthy of honour. One can be honourable from this perspective, even if nobody notices. But for many other people around the globe, honour is simply face – purely how one is seen in the community of popular opinion. To lose face in the eyes of one’s compatriots for such people is insufferable, no matter how much one may know inside that he is right. The strength of such feelings concerning face can be measured by the number of Middle Eastern men willing to kill their own sisters or daughters for perceived behaviour that is morally compromising. These people seem to think that if they kill their female relatives, they will remove the stain of dishonour from their families. We must acknowledge, even if we don’t condone, the widespread passions in this regard. But we should also remember that Asians have also contributed, via Yoga, Buddhism, and Sufism, entirely opposite and egoless sentiments – those associated with humility and compassion. From this more enlightened perspective what is important is the inner light, not the outer appearance.

• Revenge. Revenge has always been a popular at the box office, and some films, such as Dirty Harry (1971), Death Wish (1974), and the Iranian film, Tangsir (1974), have been little more than elaborate vehicles for the visceral thrill of vengeance. Revenge is not concerned with compensating or restoring the victim of the original harm, but with the infliction of an additional injury on the perpetrator that is supposed to put things in some sort of balance. In revenge films some identified evildoer(s) commit(s) some unjustified act of violence on an innocent victim, and then the entire narrative is devoted to enacting revenge – which inevitably takes place at the climax. But let’s fact it, the desire for revenge, like the concern for face, is a low and unworthy emotion. As with the case of revenge, many spiritual practices and moral counsels have urged people to turn away from these base feelings and be more compassionate: “love thine enemy”.

Of the two sentiments, concerns for face often dominate. In fact revisionist critics have suggested that the original 47 ronin were perhaps too concerned about revenge and not enough focussed on face. What if Kira had died during the almost two years between Asano’s death and their murderous attack? Then their chances of avenging their master would have been lost. This, according to Yamamoto Tsunetomo, would have been disastrous. The proper thing, according to Yamamoto, would have been to attack Kira immediately, even if their attack had ended in failure. At least it would have satisfied the stringent demands of bushido. By waiting the 47 ronin improved their chances of success, but risked the horrors of dishonour by losing face.

Besides their primitive, animalistic nature, both face and revenge share another significant property: an entire community can share in the feelings of both the restoration of face and the enactment of revenge. So at the community level these two visceral sentiments can also be combined with personal sacrifice (always popular with governments) to motivate collective actions of violence. This is undoubtedly what the Japanese government wanted to encourage in 1941. Certainly war was not a novelty to the Japanese people by 1941. Japan had already been occupying Manchuria since 1931, and in 1937 its army had carried out the Rape of Nanjing, slaughtering upwards of 300,000 unarmed civilians in little over a month. By 1941 there was no end in sight to these conflicts, and military prospects were turning menacing. The story of the 47 Ronin must have looked like an excellent vehicle for the purpose of supporting commitment to the military code.

However, the film that Mizoguchi wound up making may not have been exactly what the Japanese government was looking for. Although many rousing versions of the “47 Ronin” and “Chushingura” have been made, including landmark versions by Kunio Watanabe in 1958 and by Hiroshi Inagaki in 1962, Mizoguchi’s realisation of the story was very slow, deliberate, and almost mournful in tone. In fact his realisation of the story, which was based on a Kabuki play by Seika Mayama, was so lengthy, it was actually released as two separate two-hour films, The 47 Ronin, Part I (Genroku Chûshingura 1, 1941) and The 47 Ronin, Part II (Genroku Chûshingura 2, 1942). And both films were devastating failures at the box office. Nevertheless, the government must have been reasonably satisfied, because they awarded Mizoguchi a special prize for his achievement. Consider some of the things that Mizoguchi left ouf of his four-hour epic:

1. There is no coverage of Lord Kira’s antagonism of Lord Asano. The film more or less begins with Asano’s assault, and there is no justification for it given in the film. It is merely dismissed as a personal grudge on the part of Asano. This removes any consideration that Kira had committed an injustice and deserved to be punished.
2. Asano’s act of hara kiri is not explicitly shown.
3. There is no description of how Oishi planned to carry out vengeance. Oishi decided to murder Kira, but there is almost no discussion of tactics or strategy. We know from the original story that the ronin were waiting for the chance to make their move and had to carry out surveillance in order to find out how to penetrate his compound. None of this is discussed in the film.
4. The actual attack on Kira’s residence, which might have been a thrilling action sequence, is not shown. It is merely described in its aftermath.
5. Neither the deliberations on the part of the shogunate over how to respond to the ronins’ attack nor the actual reading of the judgement against the ronin are presented. Both of these activities take place off screen.
6. The final acts of seppuku on the part of the 47 ronin at the end of the film are not explicitly shown.

With all these significant elements of the story taking place off screen, one might wonder where Mizoguchi’s attention was primarily directed. In fact, the story focusses almost entirely on the deliberate and often ceremonial actions of chamberlain Oishi, the leader of the 47 ronin. Everyone, in the film, as well as the audience, is waiting to see what action he will take. And it is this watching and waiting that constitutes much of the film. In this respect, the story is somewhat comparable to Shakespeare’s Hamlet. In Shakespeare’s play, Hamlet is living in a world that has been set ajar by heinous, unnatural acts, and the focus is on whether Hamlet will take action to set things aright and back to their normal order. In Mizoguchi’s film, there is a similar focus, but there is a difference in the degree to which the audience can identify with the thoughts of the main character. In Hamlet, there is an almost subjective focus on Hamlet, himself, and the movement that his mind undergoes in the direction ultimately of decisive action. In The 47 Ronin, however, we do not peer inside Oishi’s mind – everything is seen from a distant and external viewpoint. Oishi, in fact, has early on made up on his mind about what to do; he’s not anguishing much over his future course of action. But noone knows just what his plans are. The film narrative revolves around our watching various seemingly mundane activities in order to see what Oishi has planned to do all along. This external watching is characteristic of Mizoguchi’s perspective: the viewpoint is never subjective in his films. There are almost no over-the-shoulder shots, suggestive of a narrative empathy with a single agent. Instead, we see things from a more distant and neutral environmental context. Moreover, Mizoguchi often shows a carefully composed shot of some of the participants of a group conversation, but does not shift the camera angle over to see the one who is speaking. Frequently this speaker is out of frame, while the camera remains focussed on someone who is not speaking and not even the principal addressee. In fact the numerous crane shots looking down from great heights or shots across courtyards suggest that there is never a consistent "silent witness", other than the building environment, itself.

Because the justification and motivation for revenge have been removed from Mizoguchi’s plot, The 47 Ronin is not really a revenge film – it is primarily an elaborate Japanese Tea Ceremony in celebration of saving face that has been disguised as a commitment to a higher principle: bushido. There are three key additional plot elements in Mizoguchi’s story that emphasise this point:

1. Oishi's Delay. Chamberlain Oishi is presented as delaying any action of vengeance on the part of the 47 ronin, not because they were all under suspicion, but because any immediate action might lessen the face-saving benefits that they sought. After Asano’s death, Oishi had petitioned the shogunate to have his house restored. He knew full well that the shogunate, aligned as it was against Asano, would deny this request, but he made the petition anyway in order to deflect suspicion from himself and the other ronin. However, because of the general public sympathy for Asano and the ronin, there was mounting pressure on the shogunate to respond favourably to the petition and restore Asano’s house. This was a concern for Oishi, and he felt that if they were now to attack during this period, it might be conjectured on the part of the public that the ronin were seeking the material benefits associated with the restoration of Asano’s house. This would lessen the image of the pure, bushido-soaked, action of sacrifice that they sought to present. “People won’t call it a clean revenge”, he explains to his son near the end of Part I. So Oishi’s delay in Mizoguchi’s film is associated with his waiting to ensure that the petition to restore Asano’s house was not at issue -- in other words, not with tactics but with enhancing face.

2. Sukeyomon's "unclean" revenge. In an early part of Part II, some time has passed and an important daimyo in Edo is shown where a Noh theatrical performance is about to be presented at his residence, with Lord Kira an expected member of the audience. He remarks that he is contemplating recommending to the shogunate that the Asano house be restored, but he is sure that Oishi and the Asano retainers still seek revenge. He consults his advisor, who has taught him the wisdom of the Chinese sages on what to do. After reflection, he says (and his former teacher agrees) that “we must act like samurai before we act in line with the Chinese sages”. This is an explicit celebration of Japanese samurai distinctiveness from the older Chinese culture. He says that if he helps restore the Asano house, Oishi will lose his chance for a clean revenge, so he decides not to make the recommendation.

One of the 47 ronin, Sukeyemon, is found by the daimyo's men to be about to attend the Noh play and is brought before the daimyo for questioning. The daimyo, speculating that Sukeyemon intends to attack Kira, intentionally minsforms Sukeyemon and tells him that Lord Kira will appear as one of the actors in the play, rather than be in the audience. Later, just off stage and before the play begins, Sukeyemon attacks a man in actor’s garb whom he thinks is Kira. But it turns out to be the daimyo, himself, who has set Sukeyemon up. The daimyo then sternly admonishes Sukeyemon, telling him that if anyone were to kill Kira now, it would spoil Oishi’s vengeance plot. Oishi and company, he explains, need to pull off something really dazzling against Kira. “Killing that miserable old man is of secondary importance”, he says. The important thing is to take revenge in a spectacular fashion. Again the point of enhancing one’s face and public reputation takes precedence over everything else, including justice.

3. Omino's face-saving suicide. After Lord Kira is murdered in Part II, the 47 ronin, all awaiting their sentencing, are held in gentlemanly custody by one of the daimyos in Edo, Lord Kosokowa. Oishi is visited at this time by a young woman dressed up as a man, who has tried to sneak in and who wishes to see one of the ronin, Isogai, whom she claims is her fiancé. It seems that Isogai had conspired to become betrothed to the girl, Omino, as part of the plot against Kira (no explanation of these operations are given in the film, but Japanese audiences would be familiar with the general outline that there was a tactical plan set up to conduct surveillance prior to the attack on Lord Kira’s residence). Omino, still in love with Isogai, wants to meet with him now in order to find out if he ever really loved her, or if he had just fooled her and used her as part of the murder plot. Oishi tells her to go away and not trouble Isogai now. If she were to meet him now, he says, it might cause Isogai to lose his nerve and fail to live up to the samurai code. He tells her to disappear and assume that Isogai had only used her. But Omino persists. “Is samurai honour so important?”, she asks. Eventually Oishi relents and lets her visit briefly with Isogai. After some initial reluctance, Isogai breaks down and confirms his love, assuring her that he is truly “her father’s son-in-law”. At this point the final verdict arrives from the shogunate castle. The 47 ronin must all commit suicide.

The ronin are now offered a ceremonial tea, prior to marching off to their deaths. As the men file through a corridor, Oishi looks into a side room, where he sees that Omino has committed hara kiri (but is still alive). Isogai is brought before her. With gasping breath, she reveals that suicide had always been her ultimate intention when she came to see Isogai. Evidently her father had lost his vassalage and position from Lord Kosokawa because of the shame of her having been stood up at the alter. So she had resolved to end her life this way to help restore her father’s honour. But at this point she is informed that Lord Ksoskowa, having heard about Isogai’s true love for her, has relented and ordered that Omino’s father be restored to his position and estate. She is offered medical assistance, but she refuses it – she wants the lie of their love to remain a lie, in order to protect the pure reputation of the ronin/samurai. She prefers that her father’s house be abolished in shame in order to protect the “clean revenge” of the 47 ronin.

All of these elements emphasise the main point: that committing mass suicide for the sake of face and bushido is preferable to life, itself. Just before his own seppuku, Oishi remarks with contentment that “it seems that they have all died without being disgraceful.” But this sentiment, no mater how artfully presented by the filmmaker, is something we must reject. The Japanese government may have been pleased with this propaganda film, because it raised the notion of saving face to a false spiritual summit. But that is not what we should cherish. Love, compassion, the reaching out to the other – these are the things that must be endorsed and expressed. Compare this film to Dreyer’s The Passion of Joan of Arc (La Passion de Jeanne d'Arc, 1928) to see the contrasting, passionate presentation of another person who goes to her death, not for saving face, but for her commitment to love.
★★