Reconstruction Vol. 16, No. 2
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Queering Film Location and the Byakkotai: Kinoshita Keisuke's Queer Sensibility and Sekishunchō (1959) / Yutaka Kubo
Abstract
It is a well-known secret that Japanese filmmaker Kinoshita Keisuke had homosexual leanings and that some of his films include strongly intimate moments
between male characters whose relationships appear rather homoerotic from our current perspective. A queer rereading of these works helps contemporary
audiences to understand better how his queer sensibility sheds light on queer characters already in Japanese cinema in the 1950s.
Keywords: queer sensibility, Japanese cinema, homoerotic, 1950s
<1> A well-known secret kept under wraps, Japanese filmmaker Kinoshita Keisuke (木下 惠介, 1912-1998) had homosexual
leanings. A number of speculations about his sexual orientation have been made, but there exists no official documentation to support it. Even were he gay,
the fact that he remained in "the closet of glass" throughout his life does not change (Kinoshita 2011: 250). What is true, however, is that certain of his
films include powerful intimate moments between male characters whose relationships appear from our current point of view rather homoerotic. I suggest that
a queer rereading of his films allows a present-day audience to understand how his personal queer sensibility sheds light on queer characters already in
Japanese cinema in the 1950s.
<2> As a successful contract director with Shochiku Film Studio, Kinoshita made a number of films on location. [1] In fact, he was known to be good at applying colors of locality to the narrative of his films and placed a high valued on the research of film locations even as he worked on his script. For instance, in his 1951 Umi no hanabi (海の花火 Fireworks Over the Sea, 1951) set in Yobiko-chō in Karatsu-shi, Saga Prefecture, he appropriated a local folktale of Princess Saya to emphasize a happy ending of a heterosexual love story. This film also points to a possible rereading of queer desires between a masculine young man and an androgynous teenaged boy, but it seemingly keeps its position as a celebration of heterosexual bonding. In the case of his 1959 Sekishunchō (惜春鳥 The Bird of Springs Past), Kinoshita uses the heteronormative narrative on the surface as well, yet at the same time he skillfully masks queer desires within a strong friendship between young men.
<3> This essay explores Kinoshita's queer sensibility by discussing Sekishunchō with a specific focus on the relationship between film location and queerness of the characters within the heteronormative context. The film is set in Aizu Wakamatsu, Fukushima Prefecture, where the spirit of the Byakkotai (白虎隊, "White Tiger Brigade") is still highly revered by individuals and community alike. I address the importance and role of the Byakkotai in nurturing Aizu men's attitude towards masculinity and male bonding in the film. Instead of reducing queer desires of characters to the filmmaker's sexuality, my aim is to show how the distinction between homosocial and homosexual is not only ambiguous but also meticulously balanced in this specific locality.
<4> The film opened across Japan on April 28, 1959, as a double-feature with Ôba Hideo's Aru rakujitsu (ある落日 A Certain Setting Sun, 1959). Since its peak in 1958, the Japanese film industry had begun to decline with the advent of various other entertainments available. As Fujimori Kiyoshi points out, a rapid increase of television installments at home already started to threaten film companies (2012: 13). Thus, it is likely that Shochiku counted on Kinoshita to make a commercially successful film to compete in an anticipated harsh battle for box office revenues during the 1959 Golden Week holidays.
<5> In an interview with Okada Susumu in 1959, Kinoshita explains the theme he had originally set for Sekishunchō:
When we turn eighteen or nineteen years old, we all experience a kind of sentimentality that boyhood is over, as we will enter the complex world of adulthood. Although this kind of deep emotion visits us when we turn thirty or forty too, what we go through at eighteen or nineteen is especially something sad, sweet, and indescribable. Holding on to the emotions of childhood, I had always read children's books; my older brother then used to scold me: "Until what age do you think you will be reading such child-like stuff?" I wanted to make use of nostalgic emotions that everyone experiences in my film. The theme of the film-as the title Sekishunchō says-is a yearning for youth. So, I will not be doing anything new this time. I just want to film the way I feel and see. And I think it will be a success if everyone can identify with a regret over the passing of youth, dispassionately flowing throughout the film. I have wanted to make a film based on the battle of Aizu. I very much liked the episode of the Byakkotai, so, making use of that element and the town as setting, I have depicted serious sentimentality of young men. (75)
Okada's interview helps us understand that Kinoshita had intended to focus on the strong male friendship and the experience of physical and emotional separations caused by approaching adulthood. Since the film did well on box office, it is safe to conclude that contemporaneous audiences likely identified with the theme.
<6> Other important aspects of this interview are Kinoshita's attraction to Aizu as the film location and to the story of the Byakkotai. [2] Throughout Sekishunchō, we see popular sites from the Aizu region, among them the remains of Tsuruga Castle, the Higashiyama onsen (hot spring) district, Mt. Iimori and Mt. Bandai. These sites helped Kinoshita establish a sense of locational authenticity in film space. Toward this authenticity, he repeatedly visited Aizu during the process of scriptwriting (Osabe 2013: 429). In fact, Aizu accounts for the visual and narrative attractiveness of the film and its successful depiction of the strong male friendship influenced by the Byakkotai episode in history.
<7> The film's implicit yet explicit depictions of queer desire arise from Kinoshita's affection toward the Byakkotai. He first encountered the subject when he was involved with the production of Rakujo, a film left unfinished because of a predicted failure at the box office. Its script by Hisasaka Eijirō, based on the short stories by Tamiya Torahiko on the battle of Aizu, included the tragedy of the Byakkotai. This was the start of Kinoshita's endeavor to embody their male bond in his work. But who exactly were the Byakkotai?
<8> The Byakkotai fought in the battle of Aizu in 1868, as part of Boshin Civil War. They consisted of 305 members, all sixteen to seventeen year-old sons of Aizu samurai families. They were one of Aizu domain's four-unit military forces. [3] Subdivisions included two squads of shichū (upper) rank, two squads of yoriai (the middle) rank, and one squad of ashigaru (the lower) rank (Hata 2002: 16). Together, they were considered a reserve unit, but when the battle was not going in Aizu's favor, they also fought at the front. Overwhelmed by the force of the Meiji Imperial faction, however, twenty members were cut off from the rest of the Byakkotai and retreated to Iimori Hill. Discussions concerning the tragedy of the Byakkotai refers in general to the twenty members of the second shichū squad and in particular to their final moments. From their position, they saw ascending smoke from the direction of Tsuruga Castle. Believing that the castle had been breached and that their lord and families had been murdered, they committed ritual suicide together. It is said, however, that the smoke actually came from the surrounding town. Of the twenty members, only Iinuma Sadakichi survived to relate the end of the other nineteen boys. The memory of their loyalty to their lord and the great trust shared among the member of the squad continue to this day to be commemorated.
<9> In 1884, Sahara Morizumi composed a Chinese poem-" Shōnen danketsu su byakkotai (Byakkotai boys unite)"-describing in detail the close ties between and the trust nurtured among the adolescents of the Byakkotai (Otsuka 2002: 72). According to Aizu native Otsuka Minoru, the Empire of Japan until 1945 exploited their story as illustrative of the jingoistic slogan fukoku kyōhei ("Rich Country, Strong Army") to propagandize loyalty to the nation in order to advance the war effort (2002: 71-73; see note 2). Notions of masculinity arose from having romanticized their deaths as a courageous and valiant deed.
<10> Despite such an historical abuse of the Byakkotai spirit, the people of Aizu have honored them generation after generation. Kinoshita emphasized this spirit as a significant element to the structure of the strong friendship between the young men in his film. To this end, he relied upon Aizu as the setting to enhance a sense of authenticity, leading audiences to believe that the friendship shared among the young men is possible because of the film's locational particularity, aas well as the Byakkotai episode. At the same time, the location betrays a sense of cinematic fiction, thereby allowing Kinoshita to challenge the ambiguous distinction between homosocial and homosexual in the representation of male friendship.
<11> Shot in color widescreen, the film opens with an image of Mt. Bandai rising high in the background. The theme song "Sekichunchō" by Wakayama Akira establishes a sentimental mood. The first scene (1:40-3:23) is comprised of a conversation between Iwagaki Naoharu (Kawazu Yusuke) and Eitarō (Sata Keiji), an uncle of Iwagaki's friend Makita Yasuo (Tsugawa Masahiko). They are aboard the train to their hometown Aizu Wakamatsu from Tokyo. It had been two years since Iwagaki left there after high school, and he is about to reunite with his four friends.
<12> Minemura Takuya (Kosaka Kazuya), a son of Ôtaki ryokan in Higashiyama, welcomes back Iwagaki. Minemura appears the kindest character in the film. The scene (3:59-5:06) develops around a conversation between the two as they enjoy their reunion, but the way in which Iwagaki closes a spatial and emotional gap with Minemura seems to trigger a stronger sense of intimacy. During a discussion about dinner with one of the maids (jochu), Minemura asks Iwagaki to bath together. The three of them appear fully shot in the same frame, and we see Iwagaki immediately starting to unbutton his school uniform with his left hand and rub his neck, now freed from the tightness of his collar. As soon as Minemura tells him to get changed, Iwagaki's left hand brushes Minemura's right. The shot changes to a bust shot of the two. Looking straight into Minemura's eyes and smiling, Iwagaki wraps Minemura's hand with both his and expresses how much he had missed Minemura. The following over-the-shoulder shot centers on Minemura who looks stunned, blinking his eyes repeatedly, barely able to respond. Kinoshita effectively shows how Iwagaki initiates the closure of any gap with Minemura through a series of minimum actions framed in different shot sizes.
<13> Their physical proximity becomes a measurement of emotional closeness. The bath scene (5:07-5:22) starts with a long shot framing Iwagaki and Minemura in the bath: they are singing the theme song together. While there is nothing unusual with two male friends' enjoying the bath together in the context of Japanese culture, there are three issues to note here. First, it is not an everyday occurrence to see two men sitting so very closely that their bodies touch, especially when there is no one else in the bath. Second, considering the narrative flow from the previous scene, it seems plausible to interpret their physical proximity as a visual representation of how any awkwardness with their reunion has been shrugged off. Moreover, the lyrical tone of the song functions as a means for them to immerse themselves in memories of a shared past and as a reassurance of their enduring friendship. Lastly, we as audiences are privileged to witness everything that unfolds on-screen. Put differently, it is our imagination that determines the exact nature of their relationship at this particular moment.
<14> However few in-depth queer readings of Kinoshita films there are, all return to a particular scene (5:50-6:23) in Sekishunchō as an explicit example of homoeroticism. It happens with the arrival of other friends-Makita and Masugi Akira (Yamamoto Yozo)-at the ryokan. As the camera frames them, Makita walks up the stairs, arm in arm, with Masugi, precisely because Masugi suffers from an impaired leg. As soon as they arrive, they are informed that Iwagaki is in the bath with Minemura. What we see in the next few shots is worthy of remark. Masugi wishes immediately to see Iwagaki and, so, awkwardly but nimbly walks down the stairs, the excitement clear on his face. In the next shot, Masugi opens the door and calls out Iwagaki's name. The camera then frames Iwagaki and Minemura-both still naked and now apart from each other-turning back their heads towards the voice. Iwagaki recognizes Masugi. Then, an incredibly intimate moment between Iwagaki and Masugi takes place. Masugi walks in, embraces Iwagaki, and expresses how much he missed him. The camera frames Iwagaki's face in close-up. Just before the bath scene ends, we see both Iwagaki and Masugi about to turn their faces to each other in proximity so close that their lips may very well touch.
<15> The literature on this film finds homoeroticism at the core of the reunion between Iwagaki and Masugi. Fujimori has argued that a sexual implication suggested in this scene through visual and tangible incongruities caused by contacts between a clothed man and a naked one and between a wet body and dry clothes is shocking (2012: 200). Fujita Wataru interprets Masugi's impaired leg as an excuse for allowing physical contacts between Masugi and Makita on screen but emphasizes the erotic tension that exists between Masugi and Iwagaki (2004: 103). I agree that the reunion between Iwagaki and Masugi is marked by incongruity that, in turn, generates a larger recognition of a homoerotic response. I believe, however, they fail to understand this scene as a possible demonstration of the strong bond between native Aizu men. Masugi can walk independently, but his friends offer him a hand naturally to support him, resulting in close physical contact. My argument here does not mean that I dismiss a homoerotic tone but that I recognize how physical closeness and emotional intimacy among these men spring from their shared experiences of growing up in Aizu Wakamatsu with the Byakkotai spirit.
<16> The first mention in the Byakkotai in this film occurs with the welcome-back party (7:10-12:52) where Midori (Arima Ineko) performs the Byakkotai sword dance (katana odori). Teshirogi Kōzō (Ishihara Akira), a son of a poor former samurai family, joins to complete the reunion of all five friends. This scene reveals that the geisha Midori had eloped with Eitarō to Tokyo but had been forced to return to Aizu. That Onizuka Heizaburō (Nagata Yasushi), an influential man of Aizu who helped Iwagaki enter college in Tokyo, bought her freedom is implied later in the film. Famous for her talent, she performs the dance for the young men, and they chant along with the Byakkotai poem. At first sight, the film seemingly sets up a clichéd relationship in which a woman becomes an object of the male gaze. And it seems to be but one of several overt examples of sexism that appear throughout, especially in Makita's attitude towards women. That Midori performs the male version of the dance instead of Onna Byakkotai for women, however, refocuses our attentions on the nature of her interesting role. [4][5] No object for sexual exploitation, Midori instead becomes the embodiment of shared memory, allowing the young men to recall vividly their own performance of the dance while still in junior high school.
<17> The boys' chant continues as background music into the next scene (12:53-14:36) on Mt. Iimori. The camera frames the boys in a long shot in which Masugi walks upstairs, arm in arm with Iwagaki. With the following shot, the camera pans slowly to the right, framing the tombs of the Byakkotai members. The chant ends as the shot moves into the next. Recalling their past experience with the dance, Iwagaki, Minemura, Makita and Masugi discuss its re-enactment (Figure 1). Masugi recalls the experience fondly, pointing out how others have changed. Iwagaki and Minemura hesitate. He wishes to become one with the others through the performance. Masugi appreciates Iwagaki's having persuaded a teacher to encourage Masugi's chant. He wraps his hands around Iwagaki's right hand, and Iwagaki places the other on top, as if responding to Masugi's affection towards him. Sensing that Masugi's feelings now exceed friendship, Teshirogi, who had yet to say anything, interrupts Masugi and suggests that they dance.
<18> Fujita's analysis of the body movements of each boy in the dance sequence (14:37-18:53) provides an intriguing reading of eroticism. This sequence intertwines the present dance with fragments from each young man's current life and flashbacks of the earlier dance. Fujita chooses a particular body movement and repositions it in another dance tradition, the nihon buyō, where, for instance, the leaning back of the dancer's body suggests female eros. But under Kinoshita's direction, the men do so, thereby allowing an unusual eroticism to emanate from their youthful bodies (2004: 19). Fujita's observation, however, leads me to conclude that the Byakkotai sword dance itself is possessed of certain visual elements that evoke male eroticism as part of its attraction.
Figure 1: Five actors in Sekishunchō (from left to right): Kosaka Kazuya, Kawazu Yusuke, Yamamoto Toyozô, Ishihama Akira and Tsugawa Masahiko.
<19> An advertisement for the film in the Yomiuri, dated May 4, 1959, relates how the film had intoxicated all the female members of the audiences (8). Film critic Yodogawa Nagaharu similarly notes just how exciting it must be to see five young men lined up, shoulder to shoulder across a colorful widescreen (73). Although it remains uncertain whether Yodogawa meant to extend such an excitement to men and women alike, his comment, nonetheless, is valuable in comparison with that by Yoshimura Hideo:
Because Sekishunchō is a film about a friendship of four young men [6], set in Aizu Wakamatsu, I expected of something masculine, but it turned out to be such a sissy film. It is not a heroic image that comes out of the scene where young men perform the Byakkotai sword dance on Mt. Iimori, but rather a kind of wicked eroticism. I remember cringing when what Iijima Tadashi would describe as "grotesque taste" came to the fore. (1985: 188)
His comment allows us to consider how audiences of different genders would perceive the image of and interactions between the young men differently. On the one hand, the newspaper advertisement clearly states that women had a positive response to the film overall. [7] On the other, Yoshimura's concern with "wicked eroticism" is riddled with negative emotions more closely associated with homophobia.
<20> Were we to put aside Yoshimura's misinterpretation of what Iijima had said about grotesqueness in Kinoshita films in his 1951 article in Kinema Junpo, [8] it is all the more certain that Yoshimura's objects arise from his discomfort towards (and/or intolerance of) what he perceives as explicit images of "sissy and weak" men. Because it is set in Aizu Wakamatsu and pays homage to the Byakkotai, Yoshimura seems to have anticipated a larger degree of masculinity among the men. What he apprehended instead was the unexpectedly erotic. Just as important, Fujita has pointed out that Yoshimura's view helps us understand the mechanism by which "sexual discrimination has become a custom in film reception experience" (2004: 103). Doubtless, sexism exists in the film, and the young men behave in accordance with prevailing male-gender codes. But Yoshimura's phobia towards unmanliness and male eroticism indicates his (latent) homophobia (Fujita 2004: 103).
<21>What does his homophobia say about contemporaneous views towards homosexuality in the late 1950s?
<22> In the immediate postwar era, a sense of sexual liberation spread among the Japanese. There had already been discussions of queer sexualities in Japan in the 1920s and 1930s, but a rise of militarism strictly censored publications on male homosexuality because they were considered contrary to a much-tortured understanding of the State as Family. Under the protocol for censorship handed down from GHQ during the Occupation, however, restrictions on these publications eased. According to Mark McLelland in Queer Japan from the Pacific War to the Internet Age (2005), publications of perverse magazines "began as early as 1946 and continued until the development of niche media for homosexual men, and slightly for lesbian women, in the early 1970s." Interestingly, much of the writing about queer desires (変態性欲hentai seiyoku) was in the form of first-person narrative. (10). In 1952, one of the most popular magazines for gay men, Adonis, was launched [9] and continued until 1962. As Ito Bungaku-editor of Barazoku (薔薇族 Rose Tribe)-recalls, Adonis was a point of origin from 1971 for Barazoku as the first commercial magazine for gay men in Japan. (19)
<25> Did the publication of perverse magazines such as Adonis and the like possible in postwar Japanese necessarily imply an increased tolerance of queer sexualities? As a celebration of the 40th issue of Adonis, Hara Hitoshi shared his opinion about what it felt like to be queer in 1958:
Since the postwar period, the liberation of sexualities has been discussed, and the discourse on the psychology of homosexuality even became a topic for journalism. However, it is still people's curiosity towards queers, and those who are homosexual still seem trapped in a kind of complexity. (2)
Hara's remark reveals a public view towards homosexuality and what homosexual men (and women) were actually experiencing in 1958. In my research, I could not find any tangible commentary on queer sexualities at the time Sekishunchō was released, but we can assume, I believe, that it was not much changed from 1958. Thus, Yoshimura's penchant for homophobia is likely indicative of what the majority of late-1950s male audiences were thinking.
<26>That said, how does the prevailing homophobia of the period make itself known (and felt) in the fictional space of this film?
<27> Contributing to the description of the essential nature of their friendship is Iwagaki's admission to the rumor that he seduced Onizuka's maid. The cene at Tonoguchihara (18:55-22:24) begins with his crying. Makita tells him to stop crying because it is sissy, but Iwagaki feels ashamed of his setback in Tokyo and goes into detail about the reason. Masugi refuses to listen and walks away. Yet, Iwagaki insists that everyone listen to his story as if to win their sympathy. And from here on, their reactions reveal two significant elements of their homosocial friendship: misogyny and homophobia.
<28> Iwagaki's motivation to seduction arose from his hatred towards her: she made fun of his Aizu accent. His description of her (kono onna and aitsu) is harsh. Makita's praise of such a masculine act betrays the influences of those male-gender codes required within the community. Teshirogi points out the irony behind Iwagaki's behavior: he had been the smartest student of thir class, but his seduction was a moment of stupidity, wasted on a worthless woman (kudaranai onna). The continued exchange between them reeks of misogyny.
<29> Teshirogi's reaction to Masugi's refusal to listen suggests a moment of awareness as he considers that Masugi may be homosexual. As Makita asks Teshirogi whether he feels upset for Iwagaki as a friend, the camera turns: captured is Teshirogi's laughing, "As a friend?" The camera turns again, this time to capture Masugi's growing anger with Teshirogi's remark and Minemura's attempt to intervene. None every utter the word doseiai (homosexuality or homosexual love). But as Fujita observes, Masugi's feelings are certainly more than friendship-it is rather close to love (2004: 22). As the film progresses, it is revealed that Iwagaki is currently wanted for complicity fraud and is back home to prepare runaway money. Beyond Minemura's gathering of money for the sake of friendship, Iwagaki, now aware of Masugi's affections, exploits that for his own benefit.
<30> The location of Aizu Wakamatsu and the spirit of the Byakkotai serve as a beautiful backdrop on which a homosocial relationship among the young men becomes clear. Far from being a directorial flaw, it proves one of the greatest strengths of Kinoshita's work. It allows him to question the balance between the relationship as a reflection of a strictly homosocial community and the one that includes homosexual desires. For this reason alone, the final scene as Masugi cries in agony over conman Iwagai's betrayal is all the richer and more poignant-and is further structure, framed as it is with a sentimental theme song about memories of passing youth, young love, and friendship giving way to the demands of.
<31> In fact, it is the fluidity inherent to Kinoshita's rejection of fast and easy answers and simple interpretations of the nature of friendship and sexualities that makes this film queer But critics all too often have been dismissive or narrow in their response. Sato Tadao's insightful analysis in Kinoshita Keisuke no eiga, the first book-length study of Kinoshita films, sees it as "an emotional story of young men separated after high school where they together performed Byakkotai dance and through their reunion wishing to prevent their friendship to fade away in the midst of harsh society" (1984: 198). His superficial focus ignores a careful implications of sexualities developing throughout the film. He also dismisses Aizu Wakamatsu solely as a strictly heteronormative and homosocial community (142). However insightful he may be elsewhere, he fails to recognize or to accept how the issue of the ambiguity of sexualities is tied to, rooted in this particular setting. In doing so, he essentially silences any discussion of queer sexualities in the director's oeuvre. [10].
<32> Later, amidst a "gay boom" across Japan during the 1990s, Ishihara Ikuko suggested that Sekishunchō is likely the first mainstream gay film in Japanese film history (1999: 226). [11]. As textual evidence, she claims that Masugi is a visual "representation of a gay figure whose emotions are clearly revealed and who in a way may appear as if Kinoshita's own coming out" (227). Although it is dangerous to equate a character's sexuality with that of a director, she does successfully make way for a queer reading of the text.
<33> Characteristic of Kinoshita's approach is this view of the world from the perspective of those marginalized. Male characters with an impaired leg-often resulting from with wounds of war--appear in several of his works. Equally important, they make virtue of necessity, often embracing their disabilities. Masugi learns to value that friendship inscribing his childhood memories. It was Iwagaki who saved him from bullies who would taunt him. Although his impairment has been read as a symbol of homosexuality (Ishihara 1999; Fujita 2004), more important are the questions raised by including such a character as a part of the larger homosocial friendship. Is it even possible to distinguish a difference between love and friendship? Is there a structural difference between the homosexual and homosocial?
<34> To answer these questions, we must look closer at the heterosexual plot involving Makita, Teshirogi and Yoko (Toake Yukiyo).
<35> Consider, for example, that of the five young men only Makita and Teshirogi are linked to heterosexual romance. Makita has feelings for Yoko, and Yoko, the bastard child of an Aizu upstart, clearly responds in kind. Despite his professed love, he gives it up because of the conflict between their families. Meanwhile, Teshirogi has become the subject of an arranged marriage with Yoko; and although he knows that both Yoko and Makita have feelings for each other, he is ready to concede to pressure from his father and accept the proposal. Having been reared in a poor family, he is attracted to an idea of marrying to a wealthy family of Aizu, and more importantly, Yoko is to his mind that dream girl with whom he thought he would never be able to engage. This resulting triangle of romance provides insights into understanding the structure of homosocial desire, precisely in its balance of the homophobic and the homoerotic. [12]
<36> The pivotal scene making everything clear (53:31~55:39) occurs before Teshirogi goes to meet Onizuka and Yoko. Teshirogi asks Makita of what he thinks about the arranged marriage. Makita insists Teshirogi to do whatever he wants because Momozawa clearly wants him as his son-in-law. Teshirogi once more asks-"as a friend"-whether Makita still cares for her. Makita jeers at him, "As a friend?" Teshirogi's single-word response in the affirmative puts an end to further discussion. The scene concludes with Teshigori's seeing Makita off screen.
<37> But there is more to Teshirogi's desire than is perhaps immediately obvious. He desires not to improve Yoko's love but to own her. By doing so, he is might also fulfill his desire to identify more closely with Makita (Fujimori 2012: 202). Put differently, he fails to conceal his homoerotic desire to know Makita better. Later, as his confession of admiration for Makita's social and financial status makes apparent, his interest in Makita's desire cues his own desire "to be" Makita. Yoko is reduced to little more than an object trafficked between men.
<38> Furthermore, if Masugi may be perceived, as some have done, as queer because of his obsession with Iwagaki-that he consciously keeps the camera that Iwagaki had asked him to pawn is telling here-then what prohibits us from regarding Teshirogi as queer when he also tries to own what Makita desires? But Teshirogi becomes the object of ridicule with the use of the phrase, "as a friend." Using the very same phrase, Teshirogi had laughed at Masugi's obsession over Iwagaki earlier, betraying momentarily perhaps Masugi's homosexual desire. This mirroring of desires implicitly blurs the boundary of homosocial and homosexual that come into play in matters of heteronomative romance.
<39> The precise nature of Iwagaki's sexuality remains uncertain throughout the film. His physical contacts with Minemura and Masugi open the possibility of his latent homosexual leanings. Still, he confesses a relationship with Onizuka's maid, as well. Indeed, Iwagaki's performance of his sexuality depends upon whom he deals with (Fujimore 2012: 198), for he changes his sexuality as if changing into different clothing. This is made implicit in the actions of the film: he wears a red scarf when interacting closely with Iwagaki, save for the bath, but his intent to present this scarf to Masugi suggests that it represents his own homosexuality. How ironic then is his insistence that it should belong to Masugi. [13]
<40> Iwagaki's true colors surface as he tries to seduce Midori with mention of the passage of the Anti-prostitution Bill in 1956 (58:41-1:01:31). Despite her denials that she is such a geisha, he continues his story in Tokyo in gain her sympathies. As he does so, he touches her hand with his left hand-precisely as he had done previously with Minemura. Seeing through his ploy, she is keen to realize, however, an absence of innocence in him and understands that he is not even in college. She encourages him to abandon his innocent friends.
<41> The complicated nature of these friendships rapidly becomes clear as Iwagaki's criminal activity is exposed (1:06:20-1:17:17). Minemura helps aids in his escape, while Teshirogi reports his whereabouts to the local authorities-for the sake of his friendship with Minemura. As Teshirogi and Masugi hurry to the station, the camera follows Masugi nimble walk. His movement is juxtaposed with the much faster pace of others along the street. The theme song can be heard in the background, this time perhaps to underscore that he cannot move faster to prevent his youthful memories of Iwagaki from fading away. Tellingly, he arrives too late to see his friend once more.
<42> There is still another relationship between Eitarō and Midori that warrants further reading. Suffering with pulmonary tuberculosis, he is Kinoshita's quintessential "failed" man. Following Iwagaki's arrest, our focus shifts to the reunion between the two. Their double suicide, triggering Makita's search for love with Yoko, functions within another heterosexual plot. Their reunion (1:25:52-1:27:03) starts with long shots framing their walking, arm in arm, up the stairs to Mt. Iimori where they pay a visit to the tombs of the Byakkotai:
Midori: Every time I come here, it makes me feel like crying. But it doesn't make me feel sad today.
Eitarō: Although they were boys aged just about fifteen or sixteen, they weren't afraid of death. (Midori and Eitarō look at each other.)
Midori: They knew what it was to live and die with all their hearts.
Eitarō: (with a sense of surprise) I wonder how they had shared the same feeling.
Midori then grabs his right hand. A series of shots and reverse-shots of each face in close-up signal an unspoken decision to die together.
<43> The ambiguity of sexualities in the region of Aizu Wakamatsu and the spirit of the Byakkotai is driven home one last time as Midori performs the Byakkotai sword dance and Eitarō's chant (1:29:52-1:31:55). As Kinoshita Chika argues (2011: 248), the structure of this scene itself is queer because this moonlit scene on the snow-covered field filmed in fixed long shots recalls a scene from Kinoshita's 1958 Narayama bushikō (The Ballad of Narayama). In contrast to authentic Aizu locations seen elsewhere, this scene is visually separated, removed-not unlike Midori's transgressive and transgender performance of the sword dance. [14]. Note here Eitarō's gaze towards her (and/or him). Is he in love with Midori for her female appearance or her transgender-like nature? Are their final moments a tragic but courageous act of a heterosexual couple deeply in love? Or does it call into question the possibilities of human sexualities?
<44> Clearly, Kinoshita is keenly aware of the various possibilities inherent in sexual desires, the homosexual and homosocial included. Masugi's physical impairment may well symbolize homosexuality, but it does so much more: it makes clear that queerness can co-exist in a homosocial relationship. Kinoshita's exploration of human sexuality, I argue, moves beyond the facile binary of heterosexual and homosexual. Sekishunchō forces upon its audience larger questions concerning physical location, representation and queerness. The final scene with Midori and Eitarō, laden with a larger sense of the fictional, opens a queer cinematic space in which Midori can fully transform into a transgender figure upon whom Eitarō can cast his homoerotic gaze. So, too, are we freed to cast our own gaze.
Principal Cast and Crew of Sekishunchō (1959)
Director: Kinoshita Keisuke
Minemura Takuya (Kosaka Kazuya)
Iwagaki Naoharu (Kawazu Yusuke)
Masugi (Yamamoto Toyozô)
Teshirogi Kōzō (Ishihama Akira)
Makita Yasuo (Tsugawa Masahiko)
Yoko (Toake Yukiyo)
Acknowledgement: This work was supported by a generous Grant-in-Aid for JSPS Fellows. Unless otherwise noted, all images were acquired under a Creative Commons license.
Notes
[1] Kinoshita made forty-nine films throughout his career. Forty-seven films were made at Shochiku, while Natsukashiki fue ya taiko (1967) at Kinoshita pro takarazuka eiga, and Suriranka no ai to wakare (1976) at Tōhō.
[2] The other three units were Genbutai, Seiryūtai and Suzakutai. Each named after the protective gods of the directions on a compass, they comprised different age groups. See Hata (2002).
[3] Fukoku kyōhei was Meiji government's policy of enhancing the wealth and military strength of the country.
[4] For a detailed discussion on the history of Onna Byakkotai, see Fujimori (2012).
[5] According to Okada who visited Kinoshita's set in Aizu Wakamatsu, differences between the Byakkotai and the Onna Byakkotai dances included that male performers wear white headbands and carry a sword, while female performers carry naginata, or Japanese halberd.
[6] It is actually five men.
[7] We cannot, of course, ignore the possibility that this advertisement was used to lure in larger female audiences. It is at this juncture important to know how actual audiences responded to the film.
[8] What Iijima Tadashi meant by the word "gurotesuko (grotesque)" in his article on the cinema of Kinoshita Keisuke was rather a compliment, suggesting a unique method of filmmaking and a welcomed addition to the Japanese film industry, where theme and form seemed to have grown monotonous. See his "Dai issen sakka ron 3: Kinoshita keisuke ron" in the June issue of Kinema Junpō (1951): 14-17.
[9] Adonis was available to subscribing members only.
[10] Using Sato's research as a guide, most studies on Kinoshita's films published after 2000 continue to ignore queer readings.
[11] During the so-called gay boom in the 1990s, two openly gay filmmakers-Hashiguchi Ryōsuke (1962- ) and Ôki Hiroyuki (1964- )-started to appear at film festivals and film art scenes.
[12] Consider Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, Between Men: English Literature and Male Homosocial Desire (New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 1985).
[13] For a more detailed analysis of the meaning of the use of the red scarf, see Fujimori (2012). His analysis examines Minemura's sexuality and obsession with the scarf, too.
[14] Although it was only a span of five years from 1949 to 1953, Arima Ineko (1932- ) was a member of Takarazuka Revue, the all-female musical theater troupe based in Takarazuka, Kobe prefecture. She performed female roles much of the time. But it is an interesting coincidence that she performs a male form of the sword dance as a geisha in Sekishunchō.
Works Cited
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Fujimori, Kiyoshi. "Iseiai taisei ka no dansei douseiai eiga: Kinoshita Keisuke Sekishuncho (How a Gay Film Challenged in the Japanese Heterosexual System: The Case of Keisuke Kinoshita's Sekishunchou)." Kinjo Gakuin Daigaku Ronshu. Jinbunkagaku hen 8(2) (2012): 193-207.
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Otsuka, Minoru. "Jitou shita byakkotai wa jurokushi ka, jukushi ka (How Many Byakkotai Members Committed Suicide, Sixteen or Nineteen?)." Ed. Kobiyama Rokuro. Tokyo: Shin jinbutsu ourai sha, 2002. 71-81.
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Yoshimura, Hideo. Kinoshita Keisuke no sekai (The Films of Keisuke Kinoshita). Tokyo: Shine furonto sha, 1985.
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