Minolta CLE Camera advertising poster featuring Nagisa Oshima, Makoto Ayukawa, Seijun Suzuki, and Shoichi Ozawa.

話にさく花　小沢昭一 文藝春秋 装丁＝矢吹申彦

Sumiko Sakamoto and Shoichi Ozawa in The Pornographers (Shohei Imamura, 1966)

Cast: Shoichi Ozawa, Sumiko Sakamoto, Keiko Sagawa, Haruo Tanaka, Ganjiro Nakamura, Masaomi Kondo, Ichiro Sugai, Kazuo Kitamura. Screenplay: Shohei Imamura, Koji Numata, based on a novel by Akiyuki Nosaka. Cinematography: Shinsaku Himeda. Art direction: Hiromi Shiozawa, Ichiro Takada. Film editing: Mutsuo Tanji. Music: Toshiro Kusunoki, Toshiro Mayuzumi.

Fascinating. confusing, sometimes funny, and sometimes just a little repellent. Must be a Shohei Imamura film. I don't shock easily, but Imamura always keeps me on the edge of being shocked, mostly because I don't know how far he'll go next. In The Pornographers, we're dealing not only with the title subject but also with incest and prostitution and even abuse of the mentally challenged, while desperately trying to sort out the very confused life of Subuyan Ogata (Shoichi Ozawa). He is one of the pornographers of the title, and he lives with a widow, Haru (Sumiko Sakamoto), who thinks her dead husband has been reincarnated as the carp she keeps in a very confining fish tank. She has two nearly grown children: Koichi (Masaomi Kondo), who seems uncommonly attached to his mother, and Keiko (Keiko Sagawa), a rebel without a cause. Ogata is obsessed with Keiko, whom he has known since she was a little girl. Nothing good is going to come out of his relationship with the Matsuda family, of course, especially after Haru gets pregnant and goes insane. But figuring out the ins and outs of the film's plot, and even whether what we're watching is flashback or dream or fantasy is part of the essence of its fascination -- and its repellent quality. Imamura isn't quite like any filmmaker I know of.

Confessions (2010)

I.. do love Hojo, I feel like he's more than the average ego-centric prick Inoue loves to show. There's a difference to making a character like Hojo and going, "what would this character do in this situation?" and making Kusaka do awful shit cause Kouhei is like, "Inoue! They like my character! Let's make him more awful!" lol, Hojo is a prick cause he's a reactionary character, Kusaka is evil in a malicious way, cause it's funny. And I hate Kusaka!! It was fun to hate him!! But the things he did were so malicious, and knowing it was just cause "the audience likes me" instead of "what would the character do" just shows the differences. Like Hojo's faults ARE his ego, but he's just the right amount of pathetic that I him so endearing (like all pathetic Inoue men). And his tendency to become obsessive over a subject really helps him as a detective, like he's an actual good one. I love episodes 18 & 19, with the pacing and the contained 2-episode plot wise, it's my favorite. It really shows Hojo's true morals, he could of brushed past this and buried it deep inside, but he truly cares about his job and what it means to others. He's forever a good guy in my eyes due to this. He turned in his hero, his mentor that taught him everything, that brought him to where he is today... and it really ate at him so much that he cries. Any other classic Inoue prick, would have manipulated the situation to their benefit, but the moment Hojo sees somethings off, he goes into his detective mode and brings the murderer (his hero) to justice. Like, legally, the most "wrong thing" I ever saw him do was go into Kino's house without a warrant cause he lost his patience waiting for him to return back home lol.

He's also.. handsome and I love him! I usually love to hate Inoue's "evil" guys, but Hojo truly feels different! Also design wise, I love him, you just HAVE to put the stuck-up, serious guy in a 3-piece suit, you just gotta! I loved that Shoichi loosened him up enough to get him to ditch the jacket to think harder about how to do Shoichi's magic trick. Do... do you think he has to take off his jacket to think harder in tough cases.... cute..... that's so cute to think about.. His haughtiness is also very cute. Like, he's nice enough to bring cake to Mana's uncle's home, but it's a gourmet cake. Eats at french restaurants. freak. eat bbq with the crew asshole.

In the beginning I was just wondering "what's this guy's fucking problem with Hikawa", but after dealing with him, it truly is his obsession of him, of this average clumsy cop saving the day one time (except for one passenger) and being placed into a position that Hojo himself was probably aiming for (being the G3 operator), it's no wonder he hated Hikawa and waits for his downfall in the beginning. He definitely loosened up a bit after his run in with Aki, teasing Hikawa about how's he's a good person haha, and actually caring about Hikawa when he got tossed into a tree, but he went back to hating him after Hikawa lost control and beat him unconscious, which.... fair, it landed them both into the hospital. Such a tension between him and Ozawa, she's the only one to verbally talk shit to him to his face lol. Much like Hikawa, he's pretty much obsessed with her and her respect. He craves getting respect from everyone and when he's denied it, or feels denied, he wants to know why and will obsess over it. He's a petty man too, never forgetting getting punched in the face by Hikawa and getting kneed by Ozawa. He believes he has to be the best.

He also recognizes righteous people! He's happy that Shoichi is Agito and he finally gets to see how human Agito is and how wrong he's been about accumulating Aigto's into one single ideal. He even finally praises Hikawa that he's on Agito's level when he's in the g3-x suit (praising Ozawa's skills by admitting this) to try and cheer him up! Another favorite scene from Hojo that shows his growth is the scene where he keeps Hikawa's secret from the G3 crew. Hojo now trusts and puts his logical sense aside to let Hikawa pilot the G3-X in the last episodes even as his eyesight went during battle. This is him putting his faith in humanity since Ozawa views Hikawa as such and it’s such a theme in Agito anyways with Hikawa being the “human” rider. Love to see it.

agito is half a show about shoichi being agito and also a domestic housewife and half about ozawa and all her boytoys

Silence Has No Wings (1966)

Black Rain / Kuroi ame (1989, Shōhei Imamura)

黒い雨　（今村昌平）

8/15/18

Confessions (2010)

Director - Tetsuya Nakashima, Cinematography - Atsushi Ozawa & Shoichi Ato

"From now on, your reformation begins one step at a time."

Black Rain | Shôhei Imamura | 1989

Kazuo Kitamura, Yoshiko Tanaka, Etsuko Ichihara, Norihei Miki, Shoichi Ozawa

Ensemble Stars! On Stage! ~To the Shining Future~

Ensemble Stars! On Stage! ~To the Shining Future~ (あんさんぶるスターズ！オン・ステージ 〜To the Shining Future～)

Romaji: Ansanburu Sutaazu! On Stage! ~To the Shining Future~ Other Names: Ansute/Ensute Stage, Ansute TtSF Year(s): 2017 Summary: The latest installment of the stage adaptation of the phone game Ensemble Stars.  Featuring idol units: Knights, UNDEAD, AKATSUKI, RYUSEITAI, 2wink. fine

Full Cast list can be found on Clockworkstage.

清談・性談・聖談そして雑談　小沢昭一 白川書院 装幀＝駒井佑二、装画＝和田誠

Mariko Kaga in Pleasures of the Flesh (Nagisa Oshima, 1965)

Cast: Katsuo Nakamura, Mariko Kaga, Yumiko Nagawa, Masako Yagi, Toshiko Higuchi, Hiroko Shimizu, Shoichi Ozawa, Kei Sato, Rokko Toura, Fumio Watanabe, Hosei Kamatsu, Akiji Kobayashi. Screenplay: Nagisa Oshima, based on a novel by Futaro Yamada. Cinematography: Akira Takada. Art direction: Yasutaro Kon. Music: Joji Yuasa.

With a burst of bluesy music, Pleasures of the Flesh starts out like a film noir, and the plot setup follows suit. The young tutor to a pretty teenager kills a man who has molested her, but the act has been witnessed by a man who has embezzled funds from his place of work. In an attempt to blackmail the tutor, the embezzler says he won't tell the police if the young man will hide 30 million yen of the loot. The embezzler expects to be arrested, he says, but he'll return for the money after serving his prison sentence. If the tutor has spent any of it, he'll tell the police about the murder. The tutor reluctantly agrees, but then the plot not unexpectedly begins to tangle. The tutor, Atsushi (Katsuo Nakamura), is in love with the teenager, Shoko (Mariko Kaga), but too poor to win her parents' approval. He's so devastated when she marries that he begins to lose his mind. The embezzler has in fact gone to prison, and Atsushi decides to live it up on the 30 million yen, then kill himself when the embezzler has served his term. And so begins a series of flings with four women, each of whom he pays to live with him. There's a showgirl with a gangster boyfriend, a married woman whose husband is desperately in debt, a doctor who insists on remaining a virgin, and a mute prostitute with a thuggish pimp. None of these attempts to wallow in the titular pleasures of the flesh ends well, and then, just as Atsushi spends the last of the money, he learns that the embezzler has died in prison. As if that outcome weren't ironic enough, the embezzler also told a fellow inmate about the 30 million yen he had stashed with Atsushi and when he's released he comes in search of the money. It's a moral tale straight out of Boccaccio or Chaucer, but writer-director Nagisa Oshima is faced with modernizing it and doesn't quite succeed. There's a bit too much fancy camerawork as Oshima interpolates Atsushi's obsessive visions of Shoko and paranoid ones of the embezzler into the narrative. The moral tale still feels heavyhanded. But Pleasures of the Flesh is the work of a major filmmaker at the outset of his career, and as such rewards watching.

ozawa truly trying her best to very clearly flag shoichi as agito is very funny like, c'mon hikawa. how are you not picking this up, dude

is agito any good? kuuga was great but agito seems not... that great...

so you started it already? yeah they’re very different shows. opposites, in a lot of ways. if i’m being as objective as possible, i’d call agito “very good.” it’s inoue’s most coherent Vision by far. the rare one where all the various pieces actually have a place in the story. & the escalation of classic rider themes is sick as hell.

but just on a personal taste level... it never really did it for me either tbh? i think it’s the lack of big important central character relationships to really get invested in. hikawa & ozawa are cute friends, hikawa & shoichi are incredibly funny whenever they interact, but. idk. the cast is a lot more “scattered” than in most other rider shows, each “branch” kinda off doing their own thing and intersecting occasionally. and for me, RelationshipLover69, it made it hard to focus on.

alas, i am cursed to love inoue’s markedly worse show faiz much more 😔

Silence Has No Wings (1966)