is a 1969 Japanese film directed by

Nagisa Ōshima was a Japanese film director and screenwriter. One of the foremost directors within the Japanese New Wave, his films include ''In the Realm of the Senses'' (1976), a sexually explicit film set in 1930s Japan, and ''Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence' ...

, starring Tetsuo Abe,

Akiko Koyama is a Japanese actress. She made her screen debut in 1955 and appeared in nearly 90 films. In 1960 Akiko Koyama married film director Nagisa Oshima, and appeared in some of his films. Selected filmography * ''Night and Fog in Japan'' (1960) * ' ...

and

Fumio Watanabe (October 31, 1929 – August 4, 2004) was a Japanese actor most known for his work with Japanese New Wave director Nagisa Oshima. He was born in Tokyo and graduated from the University of Tokyo before joining the Shōchiku studio in 1956. S ...

Plot

Based on real events reported in Japanese newspapers in 1966 ''Boy'' follows the title character, Toshio Omura, across Japan, as he is forced to participate in a dangerous scam to support his

dysfunctional family A dysfunctional family is a family in which conflict, misbehavior, and often child neglect or abuse and sometimes even all of the above on the part of individual parents occur continuously and regularly, leading other members to accommodate suc ...

. Toshio's father, Takeo Omura, is an abusive, lazy veteran, who forces his wife, the boy's stepmother, Takeko Tamiguchi, to feign being hit by cars in order to shake down the motorists. When his wife is unable to perform the scam, Toshio is enlisted. The boy's confused perspective of the scams and his chaotic family life are vividly captured in precisely edited sequences. As marital strife, mounting abuse, and continual moving take their toll, the boy tries to escape, either by running away on trains, or by retreating into a sci-fi fantasy he has constructed for his little brother and himself. Finally, in snowy

Hokkaidō is Japan's second largest island and comprises the largest and northernmost prefecture, making up its own region. The Tsugaru Strait separates Hokkaidō from Honshu; the two islands are connected by the undersea railway Seikan Tunnel. The la ...

, the law finally catches up when the little brother unwittingly causes a fatal car accident. Although traumatized, Toshio tries to help his family elude capture in the final sequence, presented in documentary fashion, describing their arrest.

Cast

as Takeko Taniguchi (the Stepmother) *

as Takeo Omura (the Father) * Tetsuo Abe as Toshio Omura (the Boy)

Production

Upon reading about the real criminal family in 1966, director

, attracted to the themes of youth and crime, within ten days had assembled a team to construct a film. Not until 1968 did a production company agree to fund the completed screenplay. In September, the 15 person crew began a mobile sequential on-location shoot described by Ōshima as cash-strapped and reliant on personal connections to complete, but marked by camaraderie and high spirits. The role of the boy was cast by searching in Tokyo children's homes, eventually finding the young orphan Tetsuo Abe. Abe's own life resembled the fractured childhood of the character he was to play, and he was allowed to join the production with the home's permission. Abe developed warm relationships with cast and crew, who tutored him while the film was being shot.

Reception

Although popular at the box office, ''Boy'' disappointed some critics, who faulted its perceived

humanism Humanism is a philosophical stance that emphasizes the individual and social potential and agency of human beings. It considers human beings the starting point for serious moral and philosophical inquiry. The meaning of the term "humani ...

as a backward step from previous efforts like ''

Death By Hanging Hanging is the suspension of a person by a noose or ligature around the neck.Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed. Hanging as method of execution is unknown, as method of suicide from 1325. The ''Oxford English Dictionary'' states that hanging in ...

'' and ''

Violence at Noon , also titled ''Violence at High Noon'', is a 1966 Japanese crime drama film directed by Nagisa Ōshima. Plot After housemaid Shino is attacked and tied up and her employer raped and murdered, it turns out that Shino and the intruder, serial ki ...

'' that engaged with

psychoanalysis PsychoanalysisFrom Greek: + . is a set of theories and therapeutic techniques"What is psychoanalysis? Of course, one is supposed to answer that it is many things — a theory, a research method, a therapy, a body of knowledge. In what might b ...

and

Brechtian Eugen Berthold Friedrich Brecht (10 February 1898 – 14 August 1956), known professionally as Bertolt Brecht, was a German theatre practitioner, playwright, and poet. Coming of age during the Weimar Republic, he had his first successes as a pl ...

effects.

Poststructuralist Post-structuralism is a term for philosophical and literary forms of theory that both build upon and reject ideas established by structuralism, the intellectual project that preceded it. Though post-structuralists all present different critique ...

film scholar Maureen Turim disputes this characterization, arguing for a continuation of Ōshima's theme of split subjectivity. The titular boy is between father and mother, "knowing and not-knowing," and paralyzed by fear of abandonment. The fantasy and the psyche figure prominently in the film, both in the boy's relationship to family, and in cinematic techniques like the use of the color red as a "focal point" suggesting the mother and loss.Turim, Maureen. ''The Films of Oshima Nagisa: Images of a Japanese Iconoclast.'' Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998. P. 89-96.

References

External links

* *
Essay at Filmref.com
{{Nagisa Ōshima 1969 films 1969 crime drama films Japanese crime drama films 1960s Japanese-language films Films about dysfunctional families Films directed by Nagisa Ōshima 1960s Japanese films