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THE MYSTERIOUS ORIENT, THE CRYSTAL CLEAR ORIENT, THE NON-EXISTENT ORIENT:
DILEMMAS OF WESTERN SCHOLARS OF JAPANESE FILM
Author(s): PETER LEHMAN
Source: Journal of Film and Video, Vol. 39, No. 1, Japanese Cinema (Winter 1987), pp. 5-15
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THE MYSTERIOUS ORIENT, THE CRYSTAL CLEAR
ORIENT, THE NON-EXISTENT ORIENT: DILEMMAS
OF WESTERN SCHOLARS OF JAPANESE FILM
PETER LEHMAN
Japan raises unique problems forWestern
film scholars. The situation can be sum
marized, perhaps a little too cynically, as
follows:Western film scholars are accus
ing each other of being Western film
scholars.Or toput ita bitmore accurately,
Western film scholars are accusing each
other of beingWestern in theirapproach
to Japanese film. Is this a genuine dilem
ma with possible solutions or is it a
pseudo-issue which obscures the real is
sues? Is it productive for us as modern
Western film scholars topursue thisquest
for the proper Japanese response?
Behind all this,of course, lurk legitimate
concerns. When studying Western Euro
pean, or even Russian or Latin American
films, American film scholars are less
prone to revert to deeply hidden cultural
differenceswhich theyfeelblock a proper
understanding of the films produced in
those widely differing nations and cul
tures. They trust their research to lead
them somehow to an accurate grasp of the
films.History and language are legitimate
but not insurmountable problems. Ifone
is puzzled, for example, about films pro
duced in Castro's Cuba, one feels that
some understanding of internalpolitics at
the time or some knowledge ofwho made
the film forwhom and forwhat purposes
will clarify the problem. We do not fear
that there is something about Cuba which
we, as English speaking capitalists, can
never know or understand. But Japanese
film scholarship seems to get quickly
mired in Orientalism. This is not just
some other culture, some other history,
some other language, or some other cus
toms. This is themystery of theOther.
Before specifically lookingatWestern Jap
anese film criticism, itmay be useful to
consider a few of Edward Said's observa
tions about Orientalism:
The Orient was almost a European in
vention, and had been since antiquity
a place of romance, exotic beings,
haunting memories, landscapes, and
remarkable experiences.
Indeed, my real argument is that
Orientalism is-and does not simply
represent-a considerable dimension
of modern political-intellectual cul
ture, and as such has less to do with
the Orient than it does with "our"
world (1,12).
Applied toWestern scholarship of Japa
nese film,we may wonder whether that
scholarship isa similar invention of the ro
mantic, the exotic, and the remarkable.
We may also wonder whether ithas less to
do with Japanese cinema than itdoes with
"our" world ofWestern film theory and
criticism. Although without reference to
Said's work, David Bordwell has suggest
ed as much. In "Our Dream-Cinema:
Western Historiography and theJapanese
Film," Bordwell characterizes much re
PETER LEHMAN isanAssociate Professor
in the Department of Drama at the University
of Arizona. He is the editor of Close Viewings, a
forthcoming textbook anthology.
Copyright? 1986by PeterLehman
JOURNALOFFILMANDVIDEOXXXIX,(Winter1987) 5
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centwork on Japanese cinema as resulting
from imposing our dreams upon the im
passive "otherness" of Japanese cinema
(45-62). Bordwell's own work, however,
has not been freeof similar charges and the
whole situation points tohow difficult the
dilemma is.
In theirwork onOzu, David Bordwell and
Kristin Thompson repeatedly attack the
work of their predecessors from the per
spective that it ismired inOrientalism,
though,curiously, theynever use thatterm
(41-73). They argue basically thatOzu, in
his use of space, color, and objects, is a
modernist filmmaker who has freed and
opened up elements of cinema which, in
the dominant Hollywood classical para
digm, are subordinated to the narrative.
Simply stated, thismeans thatOzu will
play with space, color, and objects inways
which are not thematized.
Beer bottles, for example, may have a
dominance in the compositions ina scene
which cannot in any way be explained
with reference to, say, alcoholism. Simi
larly, thebottles will never be incorporat
ed into the action as they typicallywould
in a Hollywood film when a character
picks up thebottle, smashes it,and uses it
as a weapon to attack another character. A
filmmight use color in the sameway. Red,
for example, might be carefully placed
compositionally in scenes by having char
acters dressed in red or by using a red
teapot. According to the argument, red
does not mean anything specific such as
anger, but rather is a free-floatingformal
element. In a film likeMarnie, on the
other hand, you have the classic instance
of red signifyinga complex setof connota
tionswhich include blood, death, and sex.
The playfully formal aspect ofOzu's work,
according toBordwell and Thompson, has
been ignored by critics,who force tradi
tional thematic interpretations upon
everything they notice in Ozu's films.
Donald Richie, forexample, tends to see
everything as part of characterization.
Thus, a shot of a vase which forBordwell
and Thompson results from Ozu's free
play with space and objects, getsmisread
as a POV shotbyRichie, who thengoes on
tomake theobject meaningful in relation
ship to that character's psychological and
emotional state. Paul Schrader, on the
other hand, derives meaning with con
stant reference to transcendental religious
feelingswhich he uses to characterize the
Japanese Orient. We have inRichie and
Schrader the mysterious Orient; every
thingismade meaningful with reference to
theOriental character and religion. This
kind of criticism proceeds with constant
implicit reference to the Occidental/
Oriental opposition. We are reminded
here of another observation of Said's:
"Orientalism is a style of thought based
upon an ontological and epistemological
distinction made between 'theOrient' and
(most of the time) 'theOccident."' Else
where, Said goes on to remark: "The
relationship between Occident and Orient
is a relationship of power, of domination,
of varying degrees of a complex hegemo
ny.. ." (2,6).
From Said's perspective, in other words,
theWest had to create theOrient inoppo
sition to itself inorder to thenproceed to
treat its creation in a certain way. Those
with knowledge of theOrient (that is,with
knowledge of what they have created)
have a great power-a power, itmight be
added, not just over theOrientals but also
over theWesterners who relyupon them
to understand this mysterious place.
Translated to film theoryand criticism, it
runs something like this:We (theordinary
viewer) are puzzled by Japanese films.
They look different from Hollywood
films.They look different,we are told by
thosewho know, because Japan is radical
lydifferentfrom theWest. But Richie and
Schrader understand thedifference. They
will enlighten us about the Japanese char
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acter and Japanese religion, and then we
will understand these films. It is our lack
of knowledge about Japanese culture
which blocks our comprehension of the
films.
We have something of a paradox. Initially,
our grasp of Japanese films ishindered by
their "otherness." Some critics have pene
trated (Said would say "created") this
otherness, and theywill explicate for us.
Thus, themysterious world of Japanese
films isknowable, but onlywith a special
ized knowledge which penetrates the
initialmystery. It is no coincidence that
much ismade of the fact that JosephAn
derson and Donald Richie spent a great
deal of time in Japan before writing their
seminal work on the Japanese cinema.
They, itis implied, are now ina position to
understand. This "having been there" as
pect plays a critical role in theOrientalist
literarytradition.
Bordwell and Thompson's work stands in
curious relationship to thework ofRichie
and Schrader. If the latterposit amysteri
ous otherness to Japan, forBordwell and
Thompson itall seems crystal clear. They
will studyOzu exactly the same way they
studyJacques Tati. The filmswill be care
fully analyzed and scrutinized, their or
ganizational systemswill be laidbare, and
theywill be fully comprehended without
any mysterious references to Japanese
states ofmind and religion. Before pursu
ingmy critique of thisposition, Iwant to
briefly indicate its critical reception.
Bordwell and Thompson's work on Ozu
has been most specifically and directly
criticized by Joseph Anderson and Paul
Willemen. In "The Spaces Between:
American Criticism of Japanese Films,"
Anderson charges that certain traditional
techniques of Japanese art look like tech
niques used by modern Western artists,
although the aesthetic positions should
not be confused. Thus, he cautions (with
Bordwell and Thompson inmind, though
not specifically named), "... a Western
criticwho isaccustomed to the theories of
Brecht and the films of Godard would
view Ozu as a modernist; whereas a Japa
nese critic could conclude thatOzu was a
traditionalist" (4). Anderson goes on to
claim that thefeaturesofOzu's spatial sys
tem outlined by Bordwell and Thompson
are not unique to Ozu. They were, he as
serts,used by Shimazu, a contemporary of
Ozu's who also worked at Shochiku studi
os. Furthermore, the types of spaces
outside thenarrative which Bordwell and
Thompson point to inOzu play an impor
tant role inKabuki theater and Japanese
scroll paintings. For Anderson, Ozu's use
of spaces is quite within Japanese tradi
tion.
Paul Willemen agrees with and extends
Anderson's argument. To claim Ozu as a
modernist is,he asserts, reminiscent of the
way inwhich the cubists and surrealists
viewed African tribal sculpture. He con
cludes that to see Ozu as a modernist
against the standard of theHollywood
classical style isa formof "cultural imperi
alism" (57).
David Bordwell has not been silent on
these charges. He has not seen enough
filmsby Shimazu to fullyaddress Ander
son's claim and finds that sinceAnderson
cites no specific examples, it isdifficult to
respond. He denies thatAnderson's claim
applies to Shimazu's Brother and His
Younger Sister (1939). Bordwell dismisses
Willemen's case by pointing to a central
weakness in his analogy: "African sculp
torsnever saw cubist work, but Japanese
filmmakers knew Western cinema very
well" (54).
Bordwell has here performed something of
a sleight-of-hand trick thatmakes the ar
guments disappear too easily. The fact
thatAfrican sculptors never sawWestern
art does not demolish much ofWillemen's
argument, and the fact thatAnderson cites
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no examples from Shimazu's work does
not disqualify all of his argument. First of
all, Willemen quotes Anderson's point
about the use of non-narrative space in
Kabuki, scrollpaintings, andmusic. Bord
well is silent on Anderson's claim that
traditional Japanese art relies on juxtapo
sition of separate units and spaces. Any
formal individuality thatOzu's stylemay
have (and Bordwell and Thompson em
phatically insist that Ozu's use of 360
degree space is different from any other
Japanese filmmaker's) is not really the
point. Such space clearly could have sig
nificance within traditions of Japanese art
which could be entirelydifferentfrom the
concept of "playful use of non-narrative
space." ButWillemen's next point is even
more incisive: "Ozu's films cannot be
claimed as modernist, since the point
about modernism is precisely that it is a
critique of, not a neutral alternative to,
dominant aesthetic practices" (56).
What is thepoint of calling a style "mod
ernist" ifnearly everyone who has been
watching it inevery country for fiftyyears
has been calling ittraditional?This isnot a
quarrel over mere terminology. I am in
some sense baffled as towhy Bordwell and
Thompson ever characterized Ozu as a
modernist in the first place (a point to
which I shall return).A label such as that
onlymakes sense ifthework inquestion is
fundamentally perceived as being nontra
ditional. This perception is made by
people in social, cultural, historical, and
ideological positions. Modern artmove
ments of theearly twentiethcentury in the
West, for example, clearly presented view
ers with a perceived difference. Cubism
and various abstract movements did not
seem traditional to the contemporary
viewers.Whether theyhated itor loved it,
whatever they labeled it, theyknew they
were dealing with something fundamen
tally different from traditional art.What
kind of modernism masks itself so well
that the Japanese critics and public both
immerse themselves in itas a beautiful tra
ditionalism? Indeed, why did it take
Western scholars to uncover this modern
ism?We in theWest didn't need anyone
fromJapan orAfrica to tellus thatcubism
was something new.
In discussing Edward Branigan's compar
ative studyofFellini's 8 1/2and Oshima's
TheMan Who LeftHis Will onFilm, Wil
lemen observes:
By locatingOshima on the same ter
rain as Fellini and referencing this
difference to the same set of criteria,
of concepts, Branigan is indeed, al
though indirectly,highlighting a spe
cific and crucial problem of the social
practice of the cinema: films are read
unpredictably, theycan be pulled into
more or less any ideological space,
theycan bemobilized fordiverse and
even contradictory critical projects
(55).
Earlier I claimed to be baffled at why
Bordwell and Thompson would want to
call Ozu a modernist. There is, in fact, a
fairly obvious and simple answer, and it
has todo preciselywith thisconcept of ide
ological spaces into which texts can be
pulled.
Around the time that Bordwell and
Thompson published theirwork onOzu in
theirother critical studies,with few or no
exceptions, every filmand filmmaker they
praise (Tati, Dreyer, Eisenstein, Godard)
falls outside ofwhat they term the "classi
cal paradigm." An implicit (and at times
explicit) aspect of theirwork is the equa
tion of aesthetic worth with stylistic
departure from and alternatives to the
Hollywood classical cinema. Such stylistic
strategies, they imply,"open up" the tradi
tional "closed" textand, thus, thisopening
up, this playing, this freedom, are always
equated with aesthetic value. Kristin
Thompson's work on Jacques Tati, forex
ample uses theexact same procedures and
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arrives at the same conclusion as her work
with Bordwell on Ozu: Tati is hailed as a
modernist and linked specifically, among
others, toOzu (18-19).
We can trace a relationship between this
epidemic ofmodernism and the impact of
Roland Barthes's highly influential S/Z.
Barthes criticalmethod made much of the
distinction between the traditional text
which tends towards closure and attempts
(but fails) to give fixed,unifyingmeaning
to all its elements and themodern text
which "opens up" textual space to thefree
and contradictory play of meaning. The
point remains, however, that this some
what strange linkingofOzu, Tati, Godard,
and Bresson seems to resultdirectly from
the space the critics pull Ozu's films into,
and in thiscase itisa space defined and de
veloped byWestern scholarship-be itthe
French work of Roland Barthes or the
American university film studies work.
Bordwell and Thompson go so far as to
give the following account of theirwork:
Clearly these readings, especially
Richie's, are excessively conservative
in that theynaturalize and thus fore
close themultiplicity ofOzu's spacial
structures. True, to see Ozu's films as
'open' modernist works is to discard
the cliches about their 'static,' 'tradi
tional' qualities and toyield oneself to
a dangerous freedom; the old Ozu is
farmore comforting (71).
The passage has a somewhat self
congratulatory tonewhich borders on the
absurd; you do not need Roland Barthes to
figureout theconnotations of the"danger
ous freedom" the authors evoke. To put it
simply,why is "the old Ozu farmore com
forting"? The Bordwell-Thompson ac
count ofOzu's films seems very comfort
able tome. Watching colorsmove around,
watching graphic matches, watching
spaces not used by characters in thenarra
tive, even watching vases which are not
point-of-view shots-none of these things
seem dangerous to me. Indeed, Bordwell
and Thompson leave themselves wide
open to the charge that they themselves
are offering a "conservative" reading of
Ozu. Nothing necessarily radical or dan
gerous is involved in watching non
thematized, non-narrativized patterns in
films. Itcan (andmay verywell be) a com
fortingand conservative critical activity.
Writing of Joseph Von Sternberg, Bill
Nichols observes:
"He threatens tounveil a scandal be
fore our very eyes; he invites us to
play in the gap, thewedgelike open
ing, his style unveils. The threat of
deconstruction hovers alongside a
widened space forplay. Like Yasujiro
Ozu, Sternberg can be read as a mod
ernistbut, likeOzu, thatdecisive step
toward political modernism is only
threatened, never taken (125-126).
The ideological space thatNichols pulls
Ozu intohere violentlymisconstrues Ozu
[and for thatmatter Sternberg (Studlar)]
and places him on a trajectorywhich is
purely the construct of theWestern theo
rist.Now Ozu, the heretofore traditional
ist, is seen as threatening political modern
ism,but that threat ispurely a figmentof
Nichols's imagination. No trace of inter
nal evidence suggests that Ozu was mov
ing ina particular leftistpolitical direction
and that he could not take the decisive
step. This failed step is entirely the result
of the imaginary path constructed by the
Western theorist. Nichols's remark here
clearly owes a great deal to thework of
Bordwell and Thompson. He invokesOzu
based upon theirwork which he discusses
elsewhere inhis book (109). But he isnot
comfortablewith thenonpolitical, formal
istposition held byBordwell and Thomp
son. If they triumphantly claim Ozu for
the space of modernism, Nichols goes a
step furtherand characterizes thatmod
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ernism in negative terms for itspolitical
failures. So for Bordwell and Thompson,
Ozu ends up in the happy company of
Jacques Tati, and for Bill Nichols, Ozu
ends up in the not-so-happy company of
Sternberg.We can easily see from this that
these ideological spaces have littleor noth
ing to do with anything Japanese and a
great deal to do with the favored projects
of theWestern analysts.
Finally, Iwant to turnfrom thecommonly
viewed traditionalistOzu to thecommon
ly viewed radical Oshima, for it is in
Oshima thatmany Western film scholars
feel theyhave found the trulyavant-garde,
political Japanese filmmaker.Oshima, it
seems, did not just threaten to take the
step-he took itand threatened us as a re
sult. Such Oshima filmsas TheMan Who
LeftHis Will onFilm and In theRealm of
theSenses have received wide attention in
Western scholarly film circles for their
supposedly radical features. Stephen
Heath begins his analysis of In theRealm
of theSenses as follows:
Reactions and commentaries so far
have made it only symptomatically
clear that the force of In theRealm of
the Senses ... is that of a question de
cisively posed to cinema (and thus to
any 'new' European or American cin
ema); a film which today remains
untouched by that force will not be
contemporary, but ideologically reac
tionary (48).
Elsewhere Heath comments, "Consider a
film such as Letter From an Unknown
Woman (Max Ophuls 1948), a filmwhich
from one perspective-that of the ques
tion to cinema-In the Realm of the
Senses is the direct and ruinous remake"
(49).
Heath's opening remarkabout the forceof
In theRealm of theSenses neatly bysteps
any questions about the otherness of
Japan. Here we have the trulynonexistent
Orient. Heath's ideological space knows
no national boundaries. Thus we should
not be surprised that In theRealm of the
Senses is the "direct and ruinous remake"
of Letter From an Unknown Woman. The
way inwhich Heath relates thisparticular
Japanese film to this particular classic
Hollywood film isforhim unproblematic.
Ifa Japanese filmcan address all of thefu
tureofworld cinema, why should itnot be
able to also directly address a 1948Holly
wood classic? The force fields thatHeath
constructs are not unique in his work to
theway inwhich he sees Japanese cinema
affecting theWest. In fact,Heath resolves
the Japanese problem the same way he re
solves the avant-garde problem: he
wrenches the films out of all specific so
cial, cultural, and historical circumstances
of reception and exhibition, thereby en
dowing them with qualities and forces
which directly assert themselves. Indeed,
the question Oshima becomes a littlebit
like the question Gidal (4-11). Certainly
there is no unique aspect to Oshima's
being Japanese.
Several problems immediately arise with
Heath's approach to Oshima. At the sim
plest level, one might be puzzled by
Oshima's next film,Empire of Passion,
which seems to ignore theforceof his own
previous film.Has he retreated?Has he ig
nored the very question which he previ
ously posed to all cinema? Heath is
performing a particular violence on
Oshima's work by pulling it into this type
of construct. In an interview I did with
Oshima in 1980, he firmly rejected the
typeof construct thatHeath uses forIn the
Realm of the Senses. When I asked
Oshima whether he thoughtcertain avant
garde styleshadmore political importance
than traditional styles,he replied, "I don't
think there is such a thingas thatkind of
style. In other words, I don't believe that
there isa stylethat ismore important than
any other" (59). Elsewhere in the inter
view, he comments that he feels the
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subject matter and themes of each film
dictate the style and that he wanted the
styleof each of his films to be different.
Oshima's views on films other than his
own have nothing in common with
Heath's views. During the same interview,
Oshima said of theWestern pornographic
filmsBehind theGreen Door, Deep Throat,
and Pussy Talk: "I found all of these tobe
wonderful movies, but theywere not films
that I could have made .. .
"
(58). In terms
of current Hollywood filmmaking,
Oshima admires Francis Ford Coppola,
George Lucas, Steven Spielberg, andMar
tinScorcese. His defense of classic Ameri
can Cinema is almost startlingand worth
quoting here at length:
PL: As a youngman were you exposed
to classical Hollywood films such as
those of John Ford, Howard Hawks,
and Alfred Hitchcock, and if so, do
you admire, or did you learnanything
from the classical, the older, Ameri
can movies?
ON: When Iwas a student, I especial
ly liked the films of John Ford,
George Stevens, and Frank Capra. In
that sense, I feel this tradition in
America of directors who show faith
in humanity is a very healthy, good
tradition. I also feel that the fact that
those films are that way is an expres
sion of theoverall feeling inAmerican
society. In American movies there is
the faith expressed that those who
work hard will get ahead, and right
will triumph,and I think that's an ex
pression of American social beliefs
thatmay not be possible in other
countries, so theirfilmsdon't show it.
PL: Do you feel there's any political
danger in that feeling,sincemany po
litical criticswould say that, in fact,
America doesn't provide the kind of
social context which rewards hard
work appropriately, and that it's a
myth about America rather than a
good description of theAmerican so
cial system?
ON: Of course I understand how cer
tain,probably very intelligent,people
would feel thatway about American
movies, but I don't think they speak
for themajority. I think themajority
who see those films feel that theydo
express theirown feelings (61).
Is this the radical Oshima we have been
hearing somuch about? Is thisman who
respects what he considers to be the
healthy optimism of American movies,
the sameman who, ina single film,threat
ened to blow thatwhole tradition off the
face of the earth? In fact, is thisman who
enjoys and respects filmsas diverse as cur
rentWestern pornography, new Holly
wood, and Classical Hollywood, the same
man who posed one single question to all
of world cinema-the right answer to
which would presumably send us all down
the same progressive road?Nor should we
quickly dismiss Oshima by dragging out
theold intentional fallacy.The intention
ally fallacywas once a useful corrective in
Western criticism at a timewhen critics
were prone to dwell too much and too
uncritically on the conscious intentionsof
artists. Now, unfortunately, we are tend
ing toward the opposite pole of ignoring
everything all artists say about anything.
Clearly, the Oshima constructed by
Stephen Heath bears littlerelationship to
theOshima speaking in this interviewjust
as theOshima who made Empire ofPas
sion directly after In theRealm of the
Senses bears little relationship to the
Oshima constructed by Stephen Heath.'
In his critique of Edward Branigan's anal
ysis of the relationship between Fellini's
8'/ and Oshima's TheMan Who LeftHis
Will on Film, Paul Willemen criticallyde
clares: "The two films have nothing in
common other than thatboth are part of
the cinema as an institution" (55). Inter
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estingly, though perhaps not surprisingly,
precisely here,Willemen favorably foot
notes Heath's work in Screen on Oshima's
Death byHanging. The situation by now is
probably becoming crystal clear. Heath's
pairing of Letter From an Unknown
Woman and In theRealm of theSenses is
somewhat equivalent to Branigan's pair
ingofFellini's 8/z and TheMan Who Left
His Will On Film, and Bordwell
Thompson's pairing of themodernist Ozu
with themodernist Tati. Willemen sees
Brannigan's failure as resultingfrompull
ingOshima squarely within the Screen
project of the seventies.Oshima is, infact,
much more of a pluralist than either
Heath, in particular, or Screen, in general.
Oshima isnot committed to the "progres
sive" notion of a single style,and he does
not see classical cinema from theposition
of ideological critique put forward by
Heath and Screen. In fact, it isonly by un
derstanding Screen's limited and obses
sive project of heralding certain avant
garde styles in opposition to classical
Hollywood thatwe can even understand
Heath's reading of In theRealm of the
Senses.
All importantwork currentlybeing done
in the West on Japanese cinema, then,
seems tobe caught up in theWestern ideo
logical space of itspractitioners.We have
tobe very careful about acusing each oth
er'swork ofbeingWestern. The dangers of
this can be seen easily in theOzu contro
versy. Bordwell and Thompson had no
sooner dismissed Schrader and Richie on
these grounds thanWillemen came along
and critiqued themforthe same thing.The
charge of cultural imperialism thatBord
well so neatly sidesteps is thathe is looking
at and evaluating Ozu from aWestern per
spective. The strength of Bordwell and
Thompson's work lies in their refusal to
fall into the firstkind ofOrientalist men
talitywhich I analyzed. They do not posit
amystery at theheart of Japanwhich can,
by reference toOriental religion and char
acter, explain for us all that we see in
Japanese films. As such, they have
foregrounded features of theworks which
cannot and should not be easily glossed
over by reference to things "Japanese."
Methodologically, there is, however, a ser
ious blind spot to theirapproach.2 How do
theyknow atwhat point theymay be mis
reading or misperceiving precisely be
cause they consider the systems they
analyze tobe solely properties of the films
which theycan uncover throughdetailed,
minute analysis? No cultural reference is
employed. With a knowledge of Japanese
culture, we might see a significance in
Ozu's empty spaces which, though differ
ent from theWestern concept ofmeaning,
isalso differentfrom theWestern modern
ist concept of spatial play.
If Schrader and Richie risk obscuring
thingsby running everything through ref
erences to Japanese culture and character
which are vague and generally untestable
to the readerwho relies upon the authors'
"knowledge" for the reading, Bordwell
and Thompson risk reducing the text to a
clear system of easily observable and
knowable patterns which require no spe
cial knowledge of Japanese culture. It isall
there, clear as could be. Just look carefully
and you will see everything you need to
know about systemsofmeaning inanOzu
film.Certainly, thiscannot only be seen as
a methodological limitation (which it is),
but also as a formofWestern perspective
(which it is). Aside from dropping the
name-calling and labeling, what can be
done about this difficult and frustrating
situation?
Western film scholars might do well to
foreground theirWestern perspective
rather than to deny it.Ozu isBordwell's
formalist dream, even though he can only
see every other Western scholar's Japa
nese dream. The merit of these various
critical enterprises ultimately lies else
where than inbeing a pure and Western
freeperception of Japanese films.Presum
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ably we can leave the Japanese to have a
Japanese perspective on Japanese films.
Curiously, however, Western film critics
have tended tobe dismissive of the Japa
nese criticismwhich is available to them.
Logic would seem todictate thatWestern
scholarswho are constantly attacking each
other for their Western perspectives
would be particularly interested in the
work of Japanese film scholars.Writing of
Ozu's departure from standard shot
reverse shot editing, Noel Burch ob
serves:
Various explications of thisdevelop
ment have been proposed by Japa
nese critics. Most of them are postu
lated upon the idea that it is a device
meant to express "incommunica
bility" or some such neo-Western cli
che. Sato Tadao offers, somewhat
guardedly, a slightlymore sober ver
sion, suggesting thatOzu's characters
speak to themselves rather than to
theirpartners (160).1
Here we have one of the leadingWestern
film scholars calling one of the leading
Japanese filmcritics a slightlymore sober
version of a neo-Western cliche. Similarly,
Bordwell and Thompson have littleor no
interest in Sato's work on Ozu, but they
cannot attribute this to theproblems they
have with Joan Mellen, Donald Richie,
and Paul Schrader. What underlies this
dismissiveness is the fact thatSato's work
does not fitinat allwith thecurrent inter
ests ofWestern academic filmscholarship.
This does notmean thatwe can not learn
anything from him about Japanese per
ceptions ofOzu's films.
In fact,Sato's work on Ozu adds several
insightswhich cannot be gleaned fromei
ther Bordwell and Thompson or Burch.
Many of his observations are not so pat
ently absurd thatwe need dismiss them
without serious consideration. Sato's ap
proach, however, is rooted in character,
theme, and mood, precisely the "mean
ings"which Bordwell and Thompson are
eager to evict from the Ozu text. Similarly,
Burch's dream Japan is somehow un
touched by theWestern world and his
reaction is based upon near outrage that
some Japanese seem to have allowed
themselves to be touched and dirtied by
theWest, thus losing his dream of their
pure Japanese essence. But Sato's con
cepts thatOzu's characters exist as ifthey
were guests, Sato's emphasis on the specif
ically Japanese concern with shaming
themselves, and his emphasis on feelings
of harmony and stillness inOzu's films,all
may point to legitimate Japanese percep
tions of Ozu's work which are being
ignored or downplayed exactly because
they are at odds with Western perspec
tives.4
The value of theseWestern critical proj
ects which I have been reviewing results
from how productive the space is into
which the Japanese films are pulled.5 I
have learned a great deal from Bordwell
and Thompson's work on Ozu, although I
do not feel it is freeof thedream cinema.
Similarly, it is the Western scholar
Stephen Heath who has posed a question
toWestern cinema, and not the Japanese
director Oshima. Still, there ismuch to
learn from Heath's analysis of In the
Realm of theSenses. Iwould like to con
clude with a reference to that filmwhich
might show how complex and precarious
the situation is.
It is almost impossible forWestern schol
ars to watch In theRealm of theSenses
without reference to Freudian and La
canian concepts of the phallus and cas
tration-these concepts have played such
a dominant role in our critical tradition
for thepast decade. But Oshima has no in
terest in Lacan. Furthermore, he argues
fora uniquely Japanese significance to the
castration that occurs in that film:
JOURNAL OF FILM AND VIDEO XXXIX, (Winter 1987) 13
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I feel as a Japanese man, speaking
probably for all Japanese men, that
what we would like,what we would
want, is to be able to meet a woman
who would be that intense about us in
love. I would like for that film and
that incident not to be viewed in
termsof a general kind of symbolism
about castration, because the impor
tance of it is that the incident actually
took place and entered the popular
consciousness. But once again, I think
that ishowmen would want awoman
tofeel,and theydon't thinkof thatact
in termsofpain or something like that
(58).
Not surprisingly,Oshima's next remark
was, "I found in Europe thatmany men
had misconceptions about In theRealm of
the Senses .. ." (58). This unique and spe
cific Japanese reading of the event which
he invokes isas faras possible fromalmost
all dominant Western notions of castra
tionwhere in fact the castratingwoman is
the object of intense fear and anxiety, the
"castrating bitch." No wonder Oshima
was disturbed by theway Western men
were responding to the film, since it is al
most unimaginable forWestern men to
conjure up the image of thewoman with a
knife who will castrate them as the ulti
mate image of what they desire in a
woman. Clearly Western formal criticism,
however perceptive, cannot get at such a
reading for it cannot emerge fromwhat
seem tobe systemsof organization within
the text. Similarly, a current Lacanian
based reading of the film will catch
castration up in an entirely different sys
tem of significance than that Oshima
attributes to it.
We should respectwhat we can learn from
our perspectives as witnessed in such ex
cellent works as Bordwell and Thomp
son's, Branigan's, andHeath's. We should,
however, strongly recognize the limita
tions inherent in those perspectives. We
need to not only continue reading Japa
nese films inways thatare interestingtous
within our various ideological spaces, but
also tobe aware ofhow farwe stillare from
a reading of Japanese filmswhich neither
reduces and trivializes the role of the cul
ture in understanding the films, nor
obscures throughOrientalizing the role of
the culture until everything is turned into
stereotyped "essences" of Japanese char
acter and religion.
Notes
1
The way inwhich Oshima spoke in one par
ticular interview should not, of course, be
accepted uncritically as the "true" Oshima. Art
ists change their minds between interviews,
contradict themselves, make errors, and on oc
casion even put the interviewer on with their
answers. However, even a contradictory, play
fulOshima would be far removed from the
Oshima constructed by Heath.
2
Recent conversations I have had with
David Bordwell, as well as a paper which he
read at the 1985 Society forCinema Studies
Conference, indicate that his continuing work
on Ozu will address these problems.
3
My paperoriginallydealtwithBurch'sbook
in some detail. I have, however, eliminated
most of that section for several reasons. Don
Kirihara examines Burch's book elsewhere in
this issue. It has also received a great deal of crit
icism. See for example, Scott L. Malcomson,
"The Pure Land Beyond the Sea: Barthes,
Burch and the Uses of Japan," Screen 26.3-4
(1985):23-33. Kirihara's analysis of Burch's ex
cessive polarization of Japan and theWest can
be related toRoland Barthes Empire of Signs, a
book whose influence Burch openly acknowl
edges. Each chapter of Barthes book finds an
opposition between Japan and theWest. The
West is continually characterized as almost
nauseatingly centered and heavy with meaning.
Japan is described as airy, decentered and
empty of meaning.
4
Surprisingly, no one has criticized Bordwell
and Thompson fornot pushing theirformal
analysis of Ozu's style into current areas of de
bate about the relationship of the spatial and
cutting patterns in the classical cinema to the
objedification and eroticization of women.
Does Ozu's 360 degree space with its abandon
ment of eyeline matches and attendent spatial
confusion destroy the stable erotic space of the
Hollywood cinema wherein the woman's body
14 JOURNAL OF FILM AND VIDEO XXXIX, (Winter 1987)
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is frequently presented as spectacle relayed
through the look of a man? With a few notable
exceptions (e.g. Floating Weeds, which interest
ingly lacks much of the spatial and editing
complexity Bordwell and Thompson describe
as characteristic of Ozu), Ozu's work seems to
me refreshingly free of traditional eroticism.
Bordwell and Thompson, who stop short of any
cultural or ideological concerns in their analy
sis, never touch on this issue. IfOzu's films are
not erotic inways common to classical cinema,
how does his representation of women relate to
his spatial system? Many claims made about the
nature of the erotic space of the classical cinema
could be tested in this way. Such a fore
grounding of a contemporary, Western perspec
tive would illustrate well that productive work
can emerge from a precise engagement between
Western and Japanese perspectives, rather than
from just attempting to escape Western per
spectives to arrive at a pure Japanese reading of
the films.
5
We should be careful not to oversimplify the
notion of a Japanese response to Ozu. As with
any artist in any culture, there is likely to be a
variety of responses. Quite probably Japanese
critics and viewers respond to Ozu's films in
differing and conflicting ways. Any attempts to
find thepure Japanese responsefalls intothe
danger described by Bordwell of creating a
dream Japan uncontaminated by the West.
Burch's contemptuous dismissal of Japanese
critics who use "neo-Western Cliche(s)" reveals
his desire to seal-off and define something pure
ly Japanese.
Works Cited
Anderson, Joseph. "The Spaces Between:
American Criticism of Japanese Films."
Wide Angle 1:4 (1977): 2-6.
Barthes, Roland. Empire ofSigns. Trans.
Richard Howard. New York: Hill and
Wang, 1982.
_S/Z. Trans. Richard Miller. New
York: Hill andWang, 1974.
Bordwell, David. "Our Dream Cinema:
Western Historiography and the Japa
nese Film." Film Reader 4 (1979):
45-62.
Burch, Noel. To theDistant Observer. Ber
keley: U of California P, 1979.
Heath, Stephen. "The Question Oshima."
Wide Angle 2:1 (1977): 48-57.
_"Repetition Time: Notes Around
Structural/Materialist Films." Wide
Angle 2:3 (1978): 4-11.
Malcomson, L. Scott. "The Pure Land Be
yond the Sea: Barthes, Burch and the
Uses of Japan." Screen 26:3-4 (1985):
23-33.
Nichols, Bill. Ideology and the Image.
Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1981.
Oshima, Nagisa. "The Act of Making
Films." Interview with Peter Lehman.
Wide Angle 4:2 (1980): 56-61.
Said, Edward. Orientalism. New York:
Vintage, 1978.
Studiar, Gay Lynn. "Visual Pleasure and
the Masochist Aesthetic: The Von
Sternberg/Dietrich Paramount Cycle."
Diss. U of Southern California, 1984.
Thompson, Kristin. "Parameters of the
Open Film: Les Vacances deMonsieur
Hulotr Wide Angle 2:1 (1977): 22-30.
Thompson, Kristin and David Bordwell.
"Space and Narrative in the Films of
Ozu." Screen 17:2 (1976): 41-73.
Willemen, Paul. "Notes on Subjectivity?
On Reading 'Subjectivity Under
Siege'." Screen 19:1 (1978): 41-69.
JOURNAL OF FILM AND VIDEO XXXIX, (Winter 1987) 15
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