,
literally "petty bourgeois film" or "lower middle class film",
is a
genre
Genre () is any form or type of communication in any mode (written, spoken, digital, artistic, etc.) with socially-agreed-upon conventions developed over time. In popular usage, it normally describes a category of literature, music, or other for ...
of Japanese
realist films
A film also called a movie, motion picture, moving picture, picture, photoplay or (slang) flick is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, feelings, beauty, or atmosphere ...
which focus on the everyday lives of ordinary or middle class people.
An alternate term for the is the pseudo-Japanese word , literally "common people drama",
which had been invented by Western film scholars.
The term as a definition of a specifically Japanese film genre presumably first appeared in 1932 in articles by critics Yoshio Ikeda and Ichiro Ueno.
Themes
Film historians Joseph L. Anderson and
Donald Richie define the (addressing it as ') as "
sentially a film about proletarian or lower-middle-class life, about the sometimes humorous, sometimes bitter relations within the family, about the struggle for existence,
..the kind of film many Japanese think of as being about 'you and me'."
In her book ''Nippon Modern: Japanese Cinema of the 1920s and 1930s'', Mitsuyo Wada-Marciano sees the depicting a "newly emerging modern subject, the salaried man, and his middle-class family", which "appealed to a broad cross-section of social classes", thereby helping to create "a modern national subject". Through their portrayal of social inequalities and capitalism's extended reach on daily life in the shape of company hierarchy, these films suggested a split between Japan's call for modernisation and the longing for the "mystic cohesion" of a "traditional" past. At the same time, the was criticised for a lack of genuine political content especially from the
political left.
History
The beginnings of the are assigned to the
Shochiku
() is a Japanese film and kabuki production and distribution company. It also produces and distributes anime films, in particular those produced by Bandai Namco Filmworks (which has a long-time partnership—the company released most, if not all ...
film studio and its director
Yasujirō Shimazu
was a Japanese film director and screenwriter, and a pioneer of the ''shomin-geki'' (common people drama) genre at the Shōchiku studios in pre-World War II Japan.
Biography
Shimazu was born in Tokyo, the second son of merchant Otojirō Shimazu ...
in the 1920s.
, a former assistant of Shimazu, and
Mikio Naruse
was a Japanese filmmaker who directed 89 films spanning the period 1930 to 1967.
Naruse is known for imbuing his films with a bleak and pessimistic outlook. He made primarily shomin-geki ("common people drama") films with female protagonists, ...
are two prominent directors considered to work primarily in the field of the '.
Others include
Heinosuke Gosho and
Keisuke Kinoshita
was a Japanese film director and screenwriter.Ronald Berganbr>"A satirical eye on Japan: Keisuke Kinoshita" ''The Guardian'', 5 January 1999. While lesser-known internationally than contemporaries such as Akira Kurosawa, Kenji Mizoguchi and Yasu ...
.
, although having repeatedly turned to modern subjects, the oppression of women under a patriarchical system in particular, is usually not assigned to the genre canon.
Important early (and extant) examples of the are Shimazu's ''
Our Neighbor, Miss Yae
is a 1934 Japanese comedy-drama film written and directed by Yasujirō Shimazu. It is regarded as one of Shimazu's major films, and a representative work of the shōshimin-eiga ("lower middle class film") genre.
Plot
In a Tokyo suburb, Keitar ...
'' (1934),
Ozu's ''
Tokyo Chorus
is a 1931 silent film produced by Shochiku Company, directed by Yasujirō Ozu and starring Tokihiko Okada and Emiko Yagumo. It was based on various stories in the Shoshimin-gai (Middle Class Avenue) series and shares influences with King Vidor ...
'' (1931) and ''
I Was Born, But...'' (1932),
and Gosho's ''
Burden of Life'' (1935).
Naruse's 1951 film ''
Repast'' is often cited as having launched a post-
occupation
Occupation commonly refers to:
*Occupation (human activity), or job, one's role in society, often a regular activity performed for payment
*Occupation (protest), political demonstration by holding public or symbolic spaces
*Military occupation, th ...
revival of the '.
Gosho biographer Arthur Nolletti, Jr. regards the early 1960s as the end of the genre's golden age,
with its themes moving mainly to television.
Both he and film historian Catherine Russell see it sustained in works like the
Tora-san series.
See also
*
Tendency film
is a genre of socially conscious, left-leaning films produced in Japan during the 1920s and 1930s. Tendency films reflected a perceived leftward shift in Japanese society in the aftermath of the 1927 Shōwa financial crisis. Japan's left-wing lit ...
References
{{Film genres
History of film of Japan
Film genres
Mass media portrayals of the middle class