#mizoguchi

يد إلهية Divine Intervention (2002), dir. Elia Suleiman

Zangiku monogatari (1939), dirigida por Kenji Mizoguchi

Gion Bayashi

Kenji Mizoguchi

Robin Cracknell

This movie was just one sad scene after another, and I think it displayed how fragile a woman’s social status was in Japanese society really clearly.

One of the most striking features of this movie was the objectification of women. It almost felt satirical, especially in the scene where one of Lord Matsudaira’s men is searching for the perfect concubine.

There are just so many women he looks at and it’s just one little thing about their appearance that disqualifies them from fitting the bill. Even the men acknowledge how ridiculously specific Lord Matsudaira’s wants are, but to them it is just a funny quirk. To these women, it is a means of gaining status and value in society. This kind of objectification is obscenely dramatic and shows just how disproportionate power is distributed amongst men and women in this society.

However, this film also makes it very clear that its conflict is not merely man versus woman: it is specifically Oharu—or any woman in her same position—versus everyone else. There are many moments of solidarity between women, such as when her mom comforts Oharu as she sobs over her true love dying, or when Oharu agrees to hide the bald woman’s secret from her husband. These moments can be interpreted as women bonding over the understanding that they live in a patriarchal society.

This bond is not very strong, though. In Oharu’s case, her experience as a courtesan and later a prostitute places her in a class below the average woman. The bald woman betrayed her and forced her to cut her hair in the hopes of stopping her husband from pursuing her, the nun did not believe that the very same husband tried to rape her, and Oharu’s own son only seeked her out in order to lock her and her reputation away. From the moment she tries to claim her own agency and marry a man she truly loves, she is treated like an animal by men and woman alike. (Even Katsunosuke was swiftly beheaded after they were caught; he didn’t have to live out a tragic life.)

At first, I had thought the prostitutes that come upon her as she is starving playing the shamisen would free her from her horrible fate. While they did to an extent, I would say that she achieves a humiliating freedom. Although she can speak more freely and is not limited by the social norms Japanese women are held to, no one respects her. The men on a pilgrimage laugh at her and call her a monster, and when she actually acts like one, they are amused by it. She cannot be stripped of any more status, but she still has no power or real freedom.

To write this, I used the Wikipedia page for the character names, and the synopsis really interested me. It says that Oharu failed to be a courtesan, a wife, and a prostitute. This does not consider that many of her “failures” were caused by men sexualizing her and women despising her because their husbands couldn’t control themselves. It also does not acknowledge the need to rely on men for consent (her father at one point scolds her for not having his consent to marry Katsunosuke) and retaining or gaining status within society. I think this is an unfortunate way to interpret this film. Failure does not always result from one’s own unsuccessful efforts, but it is just worded in a way that makes it sound like it’s her fault.