The last film of Kenji Mizoguchi is a subject they say he liked. There is a human interest in the lives of the women -- they are all in debt unless they embezzle. Slowly descending spirals, some a little more rapid. In the same way athletes only have a few good "peak years of production" while their bodies are young, so too the women of Tokyo's Yoshiwara district.
Western egalitarianism creeps in. Morality that had been held in check by family tradition and name is now losing ground and must build external constraints. Government intervention. Suicide seems easy, logical even. Life only gets harder.
A son disowns his mother. Humiliation.
Things change. Uncertainty.
Settle into life's groove. Where are the good patterns?
The unfortunate tune is always ringing.
Use people, charge interest.
There is no stopping you.
More melodrama than Ozu, who always askewed it. Embraced in part, allowed utterance.
The lonely bins collect the crazies.
What will stop a man from beating a double-crossing woman?
Mickey brings irreverence. Reality.
A shocking scene with her father.
Building slowly to a boiling point.
She knows him better than he does, see through him, finds the hollowness in his resolutions and desires.
A businessman wants respectability. Otherwise, he is unconcerned.
During the daytime it is a quiet anystreet.
At night, the neon lights up, the girls are out front.
Is there a new Tokyo underneath it all?
film journal entry: 07.09.2012
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