Product Description

Of all the directors who made names for themselves during the Japanese studio golden age of the 1930s, Hiroshi Shimizu was one of the most respected--and, today, one of the least well-known. A curious, compassionate storyteller who was fascinated by characters on the outskirts of society, Shimizu used his trademark graceful traveling shot to peek around the corners of contemporary Japan. In these four lyrical, beautifully filmed tales, concerning geisha, bus drivers, and masseurs, Shimizu journeys far and wide to find the makings of a modern nation.

Includes films: Japanese Girls at the Harbor (1933), Mr. Thank You (1936), The Masseurs and a Woman (1938), Ornamental Hairpin (1941)

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #28198 in DVD
• Brand: IMAGE ENT.
• Released on: 2009-03-17
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Box set, Black & White, DVD, NTSC, Subtitled
• Original language: Japanese
• Subtitled in: English
• Number of discs: 4
• Running time: 287 minutes

Features

• Of all the directors who made names for themselves during the Japanese studio golden age of the 1930s, Hiroshi Shimizu was one of the most respected--and, today, one of the least well-known. A curious, compassionate storyteller who was fascinated by characters on the outskirts of society, Shimizu used his trademark graceful traveling shot to peek around the corners of contemporary Japan. In these

Review
Every national cinema has its buried treasures and forgotten masters...the most recent revelation is the work of Hiroshi Shimizu. --James Quandt, Cintematheque Ontario

Review
A great filmmaker...our tragedy is that his best work has been kept from us for so long. Don't miss it now. --John Gillett, British Film Institute

Customer Reviews

Another Fine Discovery from Eclipse
Criterion's bare-bones Eclipse line continues its winning streak with another excellent package of films, this time from Japanese director Hiroshi Shimizu. A contemporary of Ozu's, and with a similarly long-lasting career, Shimizu's relatively unknown in the West, but these pictures serve as a sterling introduction to his work. The "travels" in the package title are literal as well as figurative -- not only do these movies cover a lot of ground, with fascinating shots of various Japan locales in the 1920s-40s, Shimizu is fond of rapid horizontal tracking shots and dissolves that give his work a dynamic feeling. These films are nicely acted, filled with gentle humor and touching humanity, and provide a fascinating exploration of a society in transition between traditional ways and the modernism of the twentieth century. According to the liner notes, Shimizu liked to work from actor improvisation, rather than fully written scripts, and that impulse pays off with work that feels as fresh as if it were done yesterday. Here's one trip any lover of Japanese cinema will find richly enjoyable.

Fascinating glimpses of pre-war Japan
Four films, each a little over an hour long, provide fascinating glimpses of pre-war Japan. Maybe the best way to describe their charms is to provide some details about two of them.

In THE MASSEURS AND A WOMAN, two blind men who make tenuous livings as migratory masseurs, moving from seaside resorts to mountain spas each summer, are walking along the road, counting and taking pride in the number of sighted people they overtake - seventeen so far. One alerts the other that he senses eight and a half children are approaching. Eight and a half? Yes, one of the children is carrying another piggyback. Later on the journey, a wagon passes them, and the same masseur somehow detects from her scent that one of the passengers is an exciting woman from Tokyo, who, as the film progresses, carries on a flirtation with him and also with a potential rival, a young man on vacation with his orphaned pre-teen nephew, who with his baseball cap and intolerance of adults could have stepped out of a fifties Ozu movie. The woman turns out to be on the run, and perhaps both suitors will be disappointed.

ORNAMENTAL HAIRPIN, also set in an inn, relates the blossoming romance between a young soldier (Ozu's favorite actor, Chishu Ryu) and a geisha who wants to leave her profession and marry. The soldier, in the inn's public baths, cuts his foot on a hairpin left behind by the geisha, and she returns to the inn, apologizes, helps him recover as he takes more challenging walks each day, and falls in love with him. Meanwhile, we meet many of the inn's guests and discover their eccentricities in casual scenes. For instance, they decide to form a discussion group (led by a crusty old professor who somehow maintains his dignity even while waking the others with his snoring each night), and the first topic is to complain about the inn's food - every day breakfast is the same: miso soup, egg, sea weed, and pickles; dinner is invariably sashimi, grilled fish, soup, and boiled greens. Finally, recovered, the soldier returns to Tokyo, and the closing scenes, in which the geisha realizes her dreams of marriage will end in disappointment, are somehow heartbreaking and unsentimental at once.