In tandem with our ongoing Cinema East series, in honor of Women's History Month, and in collaboration with CASCADIA International Women's Film Festival, we're highlighting the life and work of Tanaka with a selection of seven films featuring her work in front of and behind the camera.
These films are not available in any format for home-viewing, making these theatrical screening an extremely rare experience for viewers. Tanaka broke barriers in a male-dominated industry, and she was known for her versatility and range, both on and off the screen. Her contributions to Japanese cinema have earned her a place in film history as a pioneering female filmmaker, and she boldly placed women at the center of her film as poets, sex workers, heroines, and victims of social injustice.
Dr. Colleen Laird, one of our series speakers, further writes of Tanaka,
"With a long and illustrious career, Tanaka Kinuyo (1909-1977) is one of Japan’s most treasured film stars. During her career, she appeared in over 250 works and eventually had a presence in television. Her filmography includes dozens of titles that would be familiar to cinephiles, especially several by acclaimed director Mizoguchi Kenji such as The Life of Oharu (1952), Ugetsu (1953), and Sansho the Bailiff (1954). At the age of 65 she won the Berlin International Film Festival Best Actress award for her work in Kumai Kei’s 1974 film Sandakan Number 8. She was a strong supporter the National Film Center of Japan, now the National Film Archive of Japan, to which she donated most of her film and industry memorabilia, a great deal of which is on display in the archive's permanent exhibit. She was also Japan’s second female director.
From 1953 to 1962, Tanaka directed six films. She was able to branch out from her role as actress to director after securing a recommendation from the Directors Guild of Japan, and this was only possible due to support of film legends Ozu Yasujirō, Naruse Mikio, and Kinoshita Keisuke with whom she had strong working relations. While the influence of these acclaimed directors is tangible in her first few films—Kinoshita wrote the screenplay for Lover Letter (1953) and Ozu penned the one for The Moon Has Risen (1955)—Tanaka developed her own sensitivity to directing, hoping to make films from "a woman’s perspective” in an otherwise male-dominated industry. Each of Tanaka’s directorial works were restored relatively recently by Janus Films and have been circulating globally as a celebration of her remarkable place in film history."
Below is the lineup of special guests and speakers who will be in attendance for each screening:
March 1
Love Letter, introduced by Jeff Purdue
About the film: Released a year after the American occupation of Japan ended, Tanaka’s directorial debut explores the professional and personal conflicts of Reikichi (Mori Masayuki), a repatriated veteran who searches for his lost love (Kuga Yoshiko) while translating romantic letters from Japanese women to American GIs. As adapted from a novel by Niwa Fumio, Love Letter depicts with incisive complexity the fraught adaptation of Japanese soldiers to a changed society as well as the moral condemnation of Japanese women who entered into relations with the enemy. (Janus)
About the speaker: The Films of Tanaka Kinuyo series curator, Jeff Purdue, is Teaching, Learning, & Media Librarian and Associate Professor at Western Washington University, where he also teaches Asian cinema classes in Art History. He has also been the long-standing curator of the Pickford Film Center’s longest-running series, Cinema East.
March 4
The Moon Has Risen, introduced by Jeff Purdue
About the film: Devised by the Directors Guild of Japan, The Moon Has Risen is based on a screenplay jointly written by Ozu Yasujiro and Saito Ryosuke, and is Tanaka Kinuyo's second feature film as a director. She is also a member of the cast for this enchanting love story told from a uniquely female perspective, which follows the romantic fortunes of three sisters leading tranquil lives in Japan’s ancient capital Nara during late autumn. Tanaka’s direction is enhanced by the participation of several of Ozu’s regular collaborators, such as Chishu Ryu who plays the sisters’ father, and Takanobu Saito who composed the score. Other main cast members include Hisako Yamane, Sugi Yoko, Kitahara Mie, and Yasui Shoji, who adopted the name of his character in this film, his motion picture debut, as his stage name. (Janus)
About the speaker: The Films of Tanaka Kinuyo series curator, Jeff Purdue, is Teaching, Learning, & Media Librarian and Associate Professor at Western Washington University, where he also teaches Asian cinema classes in Art History. He has also been the long-standing curator of the Pickford Film Center’s longest-running series, Cinema East.
March 8
Forever a Woman, introduced by Jeff Purdue.
Film co-sponsored by CASCADIA International Women’s Film Festival
About the film: Tanaka Kinuyo’s third film as a director tells the story of Nakajo Fumiko, an ill-fated female tanka poet whose life was brought to a premature end by breast cancer. Set on the plains of Hokkaido, it features a fully-committed performance from star Tsukioka Yumeji, whose character deals with the pain of being separated from her son, then suddenly finds herself forced to confront her mortality, yet still invests herself wholeheartedly in one last love affair. The supporting cast includes Mori Masayuki, one of the most revered actors of Japanese cinema’s golden age, as well as Hayama Ryoji in his first film role, Sugi Yoko, and Osaka Shiro. The screenplay was penned by Sumie Tanaka, further consolidating the “films for women, by women” outlook that Tanaka Kinuyo strived to advance. (Janus)
About the speaker: The Films of Tanaka Kinuyo series curator, Jeff Purdue, is Teaching, Learning, & Media Librarian and Associate Professor at Western Washington University, where he also teaches Asian cinema classes in Art History. He has also been the long-standing curator of the Pickford Film Center’s longest-running series, Cinema East.
March 11
Love Under the Crucifix, introduced by Dr. Colleen Laird
About the film: A film about the tragic love of Ogin who is the daughter of a master of the Japanese tea ceremony (Sado), Sen no Rikyu and a Christian Samurai lord Takayama Ukon, based on a novel by Toukou Kon. Ogin marries a wealthy merchant despite being in love with Ukon. She is also asked to become a mistress of Shogun Toyotomi Hideyoshi. In order to pursue her love and fight against authority, she must make the ultimate decision. Directed by Tanaka Kinuyo, the film depicts the struggle of Ogin surviving from a female perspective and portrays the beauty of the Momoyama culture (from around year 1568 to 1600). (Janus)
About the speaker: Dr. Colleen Laird is an Assistant Professor of Japanese Studies at the University of British Columbia. Her primary focus is on Japanese women directors and she has published on the industry relationships between women directors, female identifying spectators, and the contemporary Japanese film market.
March 15
Girls of the Night, introduced by Julia Sapin
About the film: With Girls of the Night, Tanaka reunited with screenwriter Tanaka Sumie to explore the reformation of prostitutes. The film follows Kuniko (Hara Hisako), an escort who enters a rehabilitation center after the Prostitution Prevention Law prohibits her line of work. But creating a new life proves treacherous—wherever Kuniko goes, the past seems to catch up with her. In once again taking on challenging subject matter, Tanaka paints an empathetic portrait of a fragile community of untamed outcasts. (Janus)
About the speaker: Julia Sapin is a professor of Art History in the Department of Art and Art History at Western. Her research focuses on the visual culture of the Meiji period (1868-1912) in Japan with a special emphasis on representation of national, regional, and gender identities in textiles, painting, and department-store advertising. Her current research focuses on the export of kimono and kimono-like garments to Europe and the United States in the early twentieth century and the sartorial and social implications of those exports. In terms of teaching, Julia enthusiastically anticipates the sixth study trip to Japan with Western students in Fall 2023, co-taught by Professor of Fibers/Fabrics at Western Seiko Atsuta Purdue. Julia is excited about the opportunity to tap her knowledge of Japanese visual culture to delve into Girls of the Night, directed by Tanaka Kinuyo.
March 22
Equinox Flower, introduced by Dr. Colleen Laird
About the film: Later in his career, Ozu Yasujirō started becoming increasingly sympathetic with the younger generation, a shift that was cemented in Equinox Flower, his gorgeously detailed first color film about an old-fashioned father, Hirayama, and his newfangled daughter Setsuko. Tanaka Kinuyo plays the mother in this family, who exerts her quiet influence as their two daughters, as well as a female innkeeper and her daughter, work to expose Hirayama’s hypocrisy and nudge him to accept both Setsuko’s choice and the changes underway in society.
About the speaker: Dr. Colleen Laird is an Assistant Professor of Japanese Studies at the University of British Columbia. Her primary focus is on Japanese women directors and has published on the industry relationships between women directors, female identifying spectators, and the contemporary Japanese film market.
March 29
Wandering Princess, introduced by Emi Bushelle
About the film: Tanaka’s first film in both color and Cinemascope is an epic about a woman caught in the torrents of history. Based on the memoirs of Hiro Saga, The Wandering Princess depicts the story of Ryuko (Machiko Kyo), an aristocrat who, at the outset of World War II, is forced to marry Futetsu (Eiji Funakoshi), the younger brother of the soon-to-be disposed Chinese emperor. Ryuko’s enmeshment in the Japanese occupation of Manchuria realizes with startling depth Tanaka's ambition to relate a historical saga from a critical female perspective. (Janus)
About the speaker: Emi Bushelle is Associate Professor in the Department of History at Western Washington University. Her research focuses on early modern Japanese religion and thought, with a special interest in the seventeenth-to-nineteenth-century intellectual movement known as Kokugaku, or National Learning. She is currently working on a book project, "Worldly Language, Sacred Texts: Buddhist Philology and the Rise of National Learning in Early Modern Japan."
Tickets on sale at pickfordfilmcenter.org.
Founded in 1998, the Pickford Film Center serves the Whatcom community by screening independent films 365 days a year, producing and presenting the annual Doctober film festival, the Bellingham Children’s Film Festival, numerous film series and special events. The Pickford offers free documentary film showings to all Whatcom middle schools through Doc-ED and partners with students and schools for many other events during the year.
