Japanese women behind the scenes

At Nippon Connection in April a podium discussion was held about the current status of women in Japanese cinema. The reason for this was the sudden jump in numbers of films being presented at the festival with women at the helm as directors. Guests at the festival included Yuki Tanada with her film Ain’t No Tomorrows (俺たちに明日はないッス, 2008), animator Naomi Nagata (Animation Soup), Musabi students Ayako Shinohara (Baby Complex) and Mariko Tanji (Drown Breath) as well as producers Kanako Yoneyama, Hiroko Namba and Yukie Kito. Screenings were also held for three films from Momo Matsuri (Peach Film Festival): emerger (Aki Sato, 2008), Bunny in Hovel (月夜のバニー, Mayumi Yabe, 2009), and Csikospos (クシコスポスト, Yumiko Beppu, 2009). (The Peaches films will be screening in Toronto in August)

The podium discussion was moderated by Dr. Roland Domenig of the University of Vienna. Yukie Kito was representing women producers having presented Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s Tokyo Sonata at the festival. Mayumi Yabe from Peaches represented emerging women directors. Kayoko Nakanishi represented the promotional aspect of the film industry, and Nami Asakawa gave us the perspective from the point of view of translators and subtitlers.

I was impressed by the passion all four women had for the film industry in Japan. The general message seemed to be that while big name women directors have been scarce in Japan (and I might add I most countries around the world), women have come to dominate behind the scenes. Kito and Nakanishi felt that there were more women than men working as producers and promoters in Japan. Kito’s rationale for this was the fact that women make up more than 70% of film audiences. This would also explain why so many romantic comedies and dramas are produced every year in Japan. Kito also pointed out the growing number of women cinematographers, such as Akiko Ashizawa (芦澤明子, b.1951) who has become a favourite with Kiyoshi Kurosawa working on Tokyo Sonata, Sakebi (2006) and Loft (2005). Ashikawa was interviewed for the documentary Women Behind the Camera (Alexis Krasilovsky, 2007).

Since the podium discussion, I have thought a lot about women behind the scenes, so I thought that for my final contribution to the Blogathon, I would mention a number of such women that deserve more credit for the amazing body of work they have contributed to Japanese cinema history.

Kinuyo Tanaka (pictured above with Bette Davis)

The first Japanese woman to work as a director was the actress Kinuyo Tanaka (田中絹代, 1909-1977). This luminous star was a favourite of Kenji Mizoguchi (she appeared in 15 of his films!!) and appeared in over a hundred films in the course of her career. Largely due to her star status, Tanaka was given the opportunity to direct starting with Love Letter (Koibumi) in 1953. She went on to direct five more films ending with Onna bakari n yoru in 1961. Ozu, who had directed Tanaka in Equinox Flower, co-wrote her 1955 film Tsuki wa noborinu. I do hope that someone has the foresight to put her work on DVD so that it becomes more widely available outside of Cinematheque and Japan Foundation screenings.

Teruyo Nogami

Nogami (野上照代　b. 1927) was a colleague and friend of Akira Kurosawa for almost 50 years. She started out as script girl (continuity) on Rashomon (1950). By the end of his career, she had become a vital part of the team that he gathered around him for every film production. Since Kurosawa’s death in 1998, Nogami has played an important part in the shaping of Kurosawa’s legacy. In her memoir, Waiting on the Weather, she shares anecdotes about his working methods, his relationship within the Japanese filmmaking community, and his encounters over the years with great directors from around the world.

Natto Wada

Most fans of Japanese cinema know the films of Kon Ichikawa (市川崑, 1915-2008) but fewer people have heard of wife Natto Wada (和田 夏十born Yumiko Mogi 茂木由美子, 1920-1983). The two met while working at Toho. At the time, Wada, who had a university degree in English literature, was working as a translator. After the couple married, Wada collaborated with her husband on the screenplays for many of 34 as his films (mainly adaptations, but some original screenplays). Wada retired from screenwriting after Tokyo Olympiad (1965) but is said to have continued to act as her husband’s closest advisor. She sadly died much too young of breast cancer in 1983.

Animation has been a place where women have played important roles on animation teams, often working as inbetweeners and storyboard artists. Benjamin Ettinger, who seems to have an encyclopedic knowledge about Japanese animators, wrote a highly informative article on the Women Behind Ghibli on his blog Anipages back in 2007. The article discusses the animation of Akiko Futaki, Atsuko Tanaka, Masako Shinohara, and Megumi Kagawa.

Ettinger also wrote a great piece about Kazuko Nakamura and Reiko Okuyama, two important female pioneers in Japanese animation
Read:
Two pioneer women animators
Reiko Okuyama passes away


There have also been a number of great husband-wife partnerships in the world of Japanese animation.:

Renzō & Sayoko Kinoshita (木下蓮三+木下小夜子), made wonderful short films together for over 20 years and founded the Hiroshima International Animation Festical. Read more about them here.

Uruma Delvi (うるまでるび) is the pseudonym of a husband and wife team who specializes in Flash animation. Their animated short, Bottom-Biting Bug, was a cult hit a couple of years ago. Read more about them here. Or check out their website here.

Shinzo & Yukie Yuki (行信三+ゆきゆきえ) have worked at Toei as art directors and background artists for years. Most recently, they worked on the background art for Cassern Sins. Read about it at anipages.

Writing this post made me think of Keiko McDonald and what a tragedy it was that she passed away last September. When she died she was working on a book about Japanese Women Filmmakers. I do hope that someone picks up the torch and finishes her book because much, much more needs to be written about the history of Japanese Women and Cinema.

UPDATE:

I have started a wiki called Japanese Women Behind the Scenes with the aim of gathering more information in English about Japanese women directors, screenwriters, cinematographers, producers, etc.  If you would like to join this project, please click here for more information.

September 2010

Renku Animation "Fuyu no Hi"

© Catherine Munroe Hotes 2009

Sumiko 2 ( あなたの態度が気に入らない, 2008)

In Uruma Delvi’s follow up to Sumiko Forever, Sumiko shows another aspect of her personality. The first short film had a melancholic feel to it and Sumiko’s voice was sentimental and nostalgic. In I Don’t Like Your Attitude (Anata no Taido ga Ki ni iranai/あなたの態度が気に入らない), Sumiko takes on a rather petulant tone as she rattles off five things that really annoy her.

Her first complaint is about the fact that her mother always seems to make curry for dinner on the exact same days that she gets curry for lunch at school. Sumiko wonders if her mother even bothers to look at the meal plans that the school sends home.

Next, Sumiko complains that she borrowed her best friend’s cell phone, only to discover when she inputted her own name that her spelling of ‘Sumiko’ comes up sixth on the list. This is a joke that can only be understood by those who understand the intricacies of typing Japanese names into electronic devices – which can be a particularly aggravating with common names that take obscure kanji combinations. The more often you input a certain spelling of a name, the more likely it is to come up first – thus Sumiko feels betrayed by her ‘best friend’ because name is preceded by five others!

To make matters worse, Sumiko is fed up with an elderly woman she sees regularly who mistakenly calls her “Tomiko” all the time. In the song, Sumiko can indulge her inner frustrations in a way that she couldn’t in public by shouting “I am Sumiko!”


Sumiko’s fourth frustration is her confusion about why people are always surprised when she tells them she is 8 years old. It is unclear whether or not they think she looks younger or older than she actually is. In her final act of rebellion, Sumiko complains that if she is really honest, she does even really want to be singing this song.

The song is sung in enka style – a traditional Japanese singing style that is quite popular in karaoke bars. The verses are spoken and Sumiko sings the very catchy refrain “Anata no taido ga ki ni iranai” (I don’t like your attitude) with accompanying movements (à la The Chicken Dance or The Macarena).


This film follows a slightly different graphic style to the first Sumiko film. The verses of the song are done in black and white – a graphic style Uruma Delvi played with in their earlier film Mr. Calpaccio. The black and white sequences are punctuated by the refrain sequences that set an image or images of Sumiko against a dark red background. During these sequences, Uruma Delvi indulge in graphic manipulation – such as the upside-down mirror image of Sumiko shown below, or the multiple images of her shown at the top of the page.


The general graphic design of the film reinforces the theme of Sumiko feeling unsettled, confused, and angry. This is made particularly obvious during the bridge when Sumiko sings facing a stormy sea. She sings that she realises that people don’t intend to annoy her out of bad or evil intentions, but all the same she finds it very frustrating. The scene ends with an image of her sitting in a boat in a stormy sea – visually depicting the old ‘sea of troubles’ cliché from Shakespeare’s Hamlet.


Something which has not come across at all in my description of this song is just how hilarious it is. The singer’s delivery has perfect comic timing and really had me laughing out loud. Although many of Sumiko’s complaints seem trivial or petty, I think that even adults can identify those feelings of frustration when it comes to the behaviour of others. In Japanese culture in particular, where voicing one’s personal frustrations openly is often seen as bad form, I can people enjoying the venting aspect of this film. As the verses are spoken word, one could easily make up one’s own list of personal grievances while singing the song in the shower…. Or in the karaoke version which apparently is included on the DVD!

Both Sumiko Forever and this film have been available in Japan on DVD since the fall, but they have not appeared on amazon.co.jp or yesasia.com yet, though one can buy other Uruma Delvi products there – I’m hoping to get a hold of Capsule Samurai soon!

NHK Minna no Uta Oshiri Kajiri Mushi [CD+DVD]

© Catherine Munroe Hotes 2008

Sumiko Forever (2008)

I take longer than the average person to warm to CG animation. My favourite animations are those that are entirely made by hand, or involve some kind of an avant-garde process. This is not to say that I am against the use of computers in animation – they have become an indispensable tool in the editing process of even traditionally made cel animation. It is only when the use of computer technology overshadows aesthetics, character development, and story that it really leaves me feeling cold. Films entirely conceived on a computer often seem to be devoid of emotional content.

For these reasons, it has taken me a long time to appreciate the work of Uruma Delvi (うるまでるび), a husband and wife animation team who specialize in Flash animation. Their brightly coloured contribution to Winter Days was startlingly prosaic in contrast to the more poetic offerings of Jacques Drouin, Raoul Servais, Noriko Morita, Yuri Norstein, and others. Uruma Delvi's bug-eyed, bobble-headed characters, like Mr. Calpaccio, seem much more suited to comedy than to the adaptation of 17th century renku. In fact, their comedy genius has shined through in the delightful Capsule Samurai series, not to mention their big hit of 2007: Oshiri Kajiri Mushi (The Bottom-Biting Bug).



This year, Uruma Delvi, have followed up on the success of the Bottom-Biting Bug with the creation of a more heartfelt, reflective character: Sumiko Yoshida. I find 8-year-old Sumiko quite delightful, and apparently I am not alone judging from the wide range of merchandise now available with this unusual little girl's face on it. Even the internet sensation Magibon has recently done a video in which she shows off her Sumiko shirt.

The short film Sumiko Forever demonstrates why this character has become a sensation so quickly. The film follows Sumiko through the average life of a young Japanese child. First her cat wakes her up by licking her face. Then her Mom waves her good-bye at the front door before heading off to her job in a ramen restaurant. Sumiko walks to school with a friend. At school, the humiliations of gym class are counterbalanced by the delights of cooking class and playing in the schoolyard with her friends. Throughout the day she thinks fondly of her father, the truck driver, who is away from home a lot. Her close relationship with her father is demonstrated through sentimental images of Sumiko doing things with him: outside his truck posing for a photo, fishing, pouring his beer for him at the dinner table, singing karaoke together.

The secret to Sumiko's success is that Uruma Delvi have finally created a character with whom people can relate. The song is sentimental without being too sad and references the key terms of kokoro (heart) and natsukashii (sentimental nostalgia) that have a special resonance with Japanese audiences. Sumiko is also not a typical super-kawaii character like Hello Kitty, rather she is a kind of flawed kawaii. She is cute, but she has a mole on her face and big bushy eyebrows. The girl singing the very catchy title song sounds like a real girl. She sings the song ably, but not perfectly in a manufactured Disney Mouseketeer kind of way. Many Japanese place much more value on a song sung imperfectly with heart than on a song sung perfectly by a perfectly perfect looking individual. For example, Sumiko reminds me of the reasons why Kyu Sakamoto became such a sensation in the 1960s: he sang with heart, he had a 100-watt smile and a generous spirit, he came from a regular hard-working family everyone could relate to, and his spotty face and occasionally flat notes reminded that he was a flawed individual just like the rest of us.

The graphic design of Sumiko Forever is clearly influenced by the graphic design of Dick Bruna, whose character Miffy has had huge success in Japan. I particularly enjoy the little personalised touches in Sumiko Forever, like the good-luck charm swinging from the mirror in the cab of Sumiko’s father’s truck and the laundry hanging on the balconies of neighbouring houses. There is also something quite sweet about the song of a young girl learning to define herself as a person and herself in relation to her family and community. Uruma Delvi has also left some mystery about the character, as it opens up more questions about her life than it answers. I’ll be reviewing the second Sumiko film, Anata no Taido ga Ki ni iranai (I don’t like your attitude/あなたの態度が気入らない) next and I hope they continue the series.

NHK Minna no Uta Oshiri Kajiri Mushi [CD+DVD]

© Catherine Munroe Hotes 2008

UrumaDelvi Paint

Uruma Delvi (うるまでるび) are a husband and wife team known for their distintive CG animation style. They have done a lot of educational shorts for the NHK including Kabuseru Samurai (The Capsule Samurai), a series which ran over the space of four years from 2003-2006. They have also tried their hand at more independently minded projects such as their 2003 contribution to Kihachiro Kawamoto's collective project Fuyu no Hi and their film Mr. Calpaccio (2005) which they sent to numerous festivals around the world including Annency, Animafest Zagreb, and Ottawa.

In the past year they have enjoyed phenominal success with their humorous Minna no Uta short Oshiri Kajiri Mushi (The Bottom-Biting Bug). The film features a dancing and singing bug who travels from the countryside to the city biting people's bums. Normally Minna no Uta shorts run on the network for about two months, but due to its popularity the short ran for five months and the song rose to number 6 on the Oricon charts. The popular little bug was then offered a show of his own entitled "Oshiri Kajiri Mushi to Odorou!"

I generally have a rather lukewarm response to straight CG animation (when it is all done onscreen and nothing has been prepared by hand), but I have recently been warming up to the work of Uruma Delvi. Their recent shorts about a little girl called Sumiko are really excellently done and I am working on a review of them for the near future. Today, however, I wanted to share with you a newsclip I found on Youtube of an interview with Uruma-san as he demonstrates Uruma Delvi Paint. This is an animation software that Uruma Delvi developed with researchers from Tokyo University. It looks very user friendly and I could imagine both children and adults having a lot of fun with it. To see a demo click here and for more information about the product click here. Apparently they hope to have a Beta version ready for public use soon.

Under the clip, I have also written up a filmography of the animated work Uruma Delvi have done so far. This does not include their work in illustration and games. They designed some kind of an animation game called Bikkuri Mouse for Playstation 2 with Toshio Iwai, but I haven't read any reviews of the product yet.

Update (9 Dec 2023): Uruma Delvi Paint and associated content is no longer available. Instead, here is an UrumaDelvi animation demonstration from the same time period:

Filmography

• 1992 Burutabu-chan, shikato, Kutama (Ugougoruuga)
• 1993 Mamagauro (Koizumi no Tsukaenai Eigo)
• 1997 Odekake Makihara-kun (Masahara Takeyuki CD)
• 2003 Uruma Derubi GOLD (shockwave.com)
• 2003 Fuyu no Hi (Winter Days, collaborative film directed by Kihachiro Kawamoto)
• 2003-4 Capsule Samurai　 NHK educational shorts, 15秒ｘ8話 )
• 2005-6 Caspule Samurai （English Version, 20秒ｘ40話 )
• 2005 (a long day of) Mr. Calpaccio (independent short animation, 7分32秒)
• 2005 Uruma Delvi DELUXE (excite)
• 2007 Tetemete (Viacom)
• 2007 Oshiri Kajiri Mushi (The Bottom-Biting Bug, NHK, Minna no Uta, 3分30秒)
• 2008 Sumiko Forever (independent short animation, 4分55秒)
• 2008 Anato no Taido ga Ki ni Hairanai (I Don't Like Your Attitude, independent short animation, 4分03秒)

NHK Minna no Uta Oshiri Kajiri Mushi [CD+DVD]

Kids

Winter Days (冬の日, 2003)

My review of the poem adaptation Winter Days (Fuyu no hi, 2003) has been published at Midnight Eye. Unfortunately the official website, which was full of great images and biographies seems to have been taken down. I have a copy of the biographical information they had, so if I get the time (After Nippon Connection!!) I will try to translate some of the info about the more obscure animators for this blog.

Here is a list of the 35 artists featured in Winter Days, with relevant links:
(Links updated July 2016)

Yuri Norstein　ユーリー・ノルシュテイン
Kihachiro Kawamoto　川本喜八郎
Fumio Ohi　大井文雄 

Tatsutoshi Nomura 野村辰寿

Shinichi Suzuki 鈴木伸一
Hal Fukushima 福島治
Takuya Ishida 石田卓也
Raoul Servais ラウル・セルヴェ
Noriko Morita　守田法子
Tatsuo Shimamura  島村達雄
Reiko Okuyama and Yoichi Kotabe and 奥山玲子・小田部羊一
Aleksandr Petrov アレクサンドル・ペトロフ
Maya Yonesho 米正万也

Yoji Kuri 久里洋二 
Uruma Delvi うるまでるび
Seiichi Hayashi 林静一 
Azuru Ishiiki 一色あづる
Bretislav Pojar ブシェチスラフ・ポヤール
Katsushi Boda 保田克史
Masahiro Katayama  片山雅博
Mark Baker マーク・ベーカー
Yuichi Ito 伊藤有壱
Keita Kurosaka 黒坂圭太 
Reiko Yokosuka 横須賀令子
Yuko Asano 浅野優子
I.K.I.F. (aka Tokumitsu Kifune and Sonoko Ishida)  
Bai-Rong Wong (aka Bairong Wong) (Shanghai Animation Studios) 王柏栄
Isao Takahata 高畑勲
Nori Hikone ひこねのりお
Masaaki Mori 森まさあき
Taku Furukawa 古川タク
Co Hoedeman コ・ホードマン
Jacques Drouin ジャック・ドゥルーアン
Fusako Yusaki 湯崎夫沙子
Koji Yamamura 山村浩二 

Renku Animation "Fuyu no Hi"

Renku Animation "Fuyu no Hi" Kanzen Ban Box

This review is part of Nishikata Film's 2011 Noburo Ofuji Award Challenge.

© Catherine Munroe Hotes 2008 / updated 2016