Tag: Japanese cinema

Durham NC: Duke University Press, 2008.

One of the most prolific and respected directors of Japanese cinema, Naruse Mikio (1905–69) made eighty-nine films between 1930 and 1967. Little, however, has been written about Naruse in English, and much of the writing about him in Japanese has not been translated into English. With The Cinema of Naruse Mikio, Catherine Russell brings deserved critical attention to this under-appreciated director. Besides illuminating Naruse’s contributions to Japanese and world cinema, Russell’s in-depth study of the director sheds new light on the Japanese film industry between the 1930s and the 1960s.

The book approaches Japanese cinema as an industry closely modelled on Hollywood. The classical period refers to the years in which the studio system dominated all film production in Japan, from roughly 1930 to 1960. My approach to the most well known films of this period situates them within Japanese society and culture, the star system, the genre system and the film industry. While I am respectful and well-informed about the aesthetics and critical values of the canon, I am also critical of some of the ideological tendencies of this cinema, and my analyses tend to comment on class and gender dynamics. In this sense, this book is arguably a departure from the usual line of criticism on Japanese cinema. In my view Japanese Classical Cinema has had enormous influence on other Asian cinemas, especially in TV broadcast form, and it is important that the industrial production context be accounted for in discussions of the films.