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| Festival Year |
Festival Section |
| 2015 |
SPECIAL EVENTS |
| Film Title |
CHUJI TABINIKKI (fragments) Pt. 2: SHINSHU KESSHO HEN Pt. 3: GOYO HEN
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| Alternative Title 1 |
[A Diary of Chuji’s Travels] (frammenti) Pt. 2: [Riso cruento a Shinshu]
Pt. 3: [In nome della legge]
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| Alternative Title 2 |
[A Diary of Chuji’s Travels] (fragments) Pt. 2:[Bloody Laughter in Shinshu] Pt. 3: [In the Name of the Law]
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| Alternative Title 3 |
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| Country |
Japan |
| Release Date |
14 August 1927 |
| Production Co. |
Nikkatsu |
| Director |
Daisuke Ito |
| Format |
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Speed (fps) |
| 35mm |
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16 |
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| Footage |
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Time |
| 6679 ft. |
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111' |
| Archive Source |
National Film Center, National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo. |
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| Print Notes |
orig. l: 21,457 ft.; incompleto/incomplete, frammenti di/fragments of Pt. 2 + Pt. 3
did./ titles: JAP, subt. ENG |
| Cast |
| (Pt. 3): Denjiro Okochi (Chuji Kunisada), Naoe Fushimi (Oshina), Ranko Sawa (Okume), Motoharu Isokawa (Kihei, fabbricante di sake/a sake brewer), Eiji Murakami (Ginjiro), Nobuko Akitsuki (Yujo Nobuo), Kajo Onoe (Washizu no Otozo), Mononosuke Ichikawa (Takasaski no Jukichi) |
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| Other Credits |
| scen., sogg./orig. story: Daisuke Ito; f./ph: Rokuzo Watarai (Pt. 2), Hiromitsu Karasawa (Pt. 3); cast (Pt. 2): Denjiro Okochi (Chuji Kunisada), Hideo Nakamura (Kantaro), Kichiji Nakamura (Kabe Yaesemon), Seinosuke Sakamoto (Mitsuki no Bunzo) |
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| Other Information |
| data uscita/rel: 14.8.1927 (Pt. 2), 27.12.1927 (Pt. 3) |
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| Program Notes |
Daisuke Ito (1898-1981) played a central part in bringing a hitherto unknown level of stylistic sophistication and political awareness to the genre of jidaigeki (historical films). Often called “the father of jidaigeki” by critics and movie fans in Japan, Ito was the prolific director of nearly a hundred jidaigeki films, several of which are hailed among the finest films ever produced in Japan. Instrumental in developing the theatrical kyugeki, or “old style”, period film into shin-jidaigeki, its modern variation, these films utilized contemporary storytelling form with historical settings, often politically charged, yet still engaged with the social issues of their own time, thinly veiled by placing them “safely” in the past. These socially conscious period films, often choosing for their protagonist a disgruntled, lonely, nihilistic drifter, pitted against society or the rigid social and political structure of feudal times, were occasionally referred to as keiko-eiga, “tendency films” or left-leaning commerical films, and reached their zenith in the years leading up to 1930, after which harsh state censorship smothered the genre.
Described by David Bordwell as “calligraphic”, Ito’s fluid camera style, combined with fast-paced action and rapid cutting, created a cinema of flourishes which earned Ito his well-known nickname “Ido daisuki” (a pun on his name, meaning “great fan of [camera] movement”). After Ito left the Shochiku studio, he eventually joined Nikkatsu in 1926. It was there during 1927 and 1928 that he would come to create his famous re-telling of the story of the gambler-outlaw Chuji Kunisada (1810-1850) in his 3-part Chuji Tabinikki (A Diary of Chuji’s Travels). Described by S.A. Thornton as “a deeply pessimistic story of resistance and betrayal”, not only did it establish Ito as a leader of the “tendency” period film, but it served to cement the working relationship between Ito and the film’s star, Denjiro Okochi (1898-1962). Mariann Lewinsky has aptly noted that “both a director’s film and an actors’ showcase, Chuji Tabinikki boasts a display of a presentational acting style which features virtuoso performances in scene after scene.”
Today Ito’s trilogy survives only in fragments, obtained by Tokyo’s National Film Center in 1991. Of the first part, Koshu satsujin hen (Death Squad in Koshu), nothing survives. However, one episode of the second part, Shinshu kessho hen (Bloody Laughter in Shinshu), and about half of the third part, Goyo hen (In the Name of the Law), have been restored, including a shortened version of the powerful finale. Lewinsky, writing on the occasion of the screening of this material at the 2001 Giornate del Cinema Muto, commented: “Now lost is the overall triptych structure, described in contemporary reviews as a succession of dominant moods, from the ‘freshness’ of the first part, via the intense ‘sentiment’ of the central section, on into the ‘dark nihilism’ of the final epilogue. However, the material that remains does contain a comparable mood modulation in microcosm, and, along with it, Chuji’s utter decline from an athletic, invincible superhero into a paralysed, mute body on a stretcher. Also lost is the network of recurring motifs, both plot-related and visual, but some remnants (such as the circle motif in the giant brewery vats and the ring-around-the-rosy game of the children linking hands) demonstrate the director’s visual sense and creative power in this respect.”
Ito’s sophisticated understanding of the jidaigeki genre’s tropes and themes also allowed him to subvert them; Chuji Tabinikki is a prime example of this. Rather than conform to the archetypical tragic romantic ending, in which the protagonist dies a beautiful and heroic death, the film instead turns darkly nihilistic: Ito denies his hero the fulfilment of this narrative plot pattern, reducing his protagonist to a cripple who can only watch as his followers vainly sacrifice themselves one by one to save him in the film’s legendary final battle. Lewinsky comments, “In making his hero fall so much further, Ito confers on him a far more intense level of tragedy. Ito’s ugly, shameful ending is more moving than the usual beautiful-tragic one, and therefore more beautiful. Seen as a genre film, Chuji Tabinikki intensifies, extends, and transforms the standard formulae throughout.”
The Restoration Since parts of the film were discovered in 1991, the National Film Center at the National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo, has to date undertaken the restoration of Chuji Tabinikki three times. The original 3-part trilogy’s complete length was 6,540 metres; the 1991 find, a 35mm nitrate print from a digest version of material from Parts 2 and 3, partially tinted and in deteriorated condition, totalled 1800 metres. The 1992 and 2001 restorations, carried out by the IMAGICA West laboratory, utilized analogue techniques. In 1992 an internegative on safety stock was struck from the nitrate print, employing the wet-gate printing process; in 2001 a total-immersion process was applied. When the National Film Center decided in 2010 to undertake the project of restoring this canonical work a third time, it was decided that it would be a digital restoration by IMAGICA.
First a 35mm internegative was struck from the 35mm screening print source material, using the wet-gate process. This was then scanned at 4K resolution, although the actual restoration work was carried out in 2K. Lost intertitles were added based on the script, and the screen-time of some hard-to-read intertitles was extended. This digital material then underwent grading, after which the 2K material was used to create a 35mm black & white negative. Finally, this negative was used as a basis for creating a tinted print using an analogue photochemical process at IMAGICA West.
The digital restoration of Chuji Tabinikki constitutes the National Film Center’s latest effort to restore one of the true masterpieces of Japanese cinema to a previously unprecendented level of clarity.
The Presentation Chuji Tabinikki will be presented with the benshi narration of Ichiro Kataoka, performing together with the three-piece musical ensemble Otowaza, which consists of Ayumi Kamiya (piano), Yasumi Miyazawa (shamisen [Japanese three-stringed instrument]), and Masayoshi Tanaka (percussion and taiko [Japanese drum]). A special score has been composed by Kamiya and Miyazawa for the occasion.
Kataoka is thrilled to be performing the narration for this masterpiece of Japanese cinema: “Chuji Tabinikki has often been called the pinnacle of Japanese silent cinema, yet for the longest time it was believed to be lost forever. When it was miraculously rediscovered in 1991, it came to fill what had been a large void in the history of Japanese cinema. For us, Chuji Tabinikki is not just a famous masterpiece, it has become a symbol for rediscovery and restoration. There is no greater joy than for us to be able to perform in Pordenone with the latest restoration of this legendary film.” – Johan Nordström
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