Musica che affronta il silenzio - Scritti su Toru Takemitsu - Pavia ...

Music Facing Up to Silence. Writings on Tru Takemitsu
quite clearly, and provides various stimuli for analysis and subsequent reflections. I shall
now present a brief analysis of Kwaidan by way of example. 31
A grand fresco of feudal Japan
Kwaidan (1964), presenting a sweeping portrait of feudal Japan, is perhaps Masaki
Kobayashi’s most famous film, winner of the Special Jury Prize at the 1965 Cannes Festival.
32 During the 1950s Kobayashi made a name for himself with a number of films
with a precise point to make, many of them taking an intransigently anti-war stance. So
one can perhaps characterise Kobayashi as making ‘militant cinema’, although his approach
seemed to avoid ideological implications. 33 In The Thick-walled Room (Kabe
atsuki heya, 1956), with a script by the writer Kb Abe based on the diaries of soldiers
imprisoned following the War accused of committing war crimes, the director’s position
can be described as one of ‘moral solicitation, an invitation to engage in a more searching
reflection on all the wrong that had been done’ (Novielli 2001: 148). After an investigation
of the world of sport and the corruption at work within it (I’ll Buy You, Anata
kaimasu, 1956), Kobayashi turned his attention to the situation of the American bases
(Black River, Kuroi kawa, 1957) and then went on to film the monumental The Human
Condition I (Ningen no jken, 1959-1961), lasting nearly ten hours. The 1960s saw the
famous triptych which secured its author a number of prestigious prizes: Kwaidan, Seppuku,
Special Prize at Cannes, in which Kokayashi criticised the bushid and the ideals of
the samurai in the collective imagination in Japan, 34 and Samurai Rebellion (Ji-uchi,
1967), Critics’ Prize at Venice, a further attack on the mores of the past in the story of the
revenge wreaked by a samurai for a slight on his honour.
Drawing on the writings of Yakomo Koizumi (alias Lafcadio Hearn), Kwaidan deals
with some of the typical motifs of Japanese culture in four episodes characterised by the inco-
31
Takemitsu himself referred to Kwaidan and Susa no onna as the two peaks of his experimentation in sound.
Cf. Tessier (1985: 100).
32
‘Basically, a Japanese film practically has no chance of existing in the West unless it has been screened at
an important film festival, or, better still, awarded a prize. [...] Thanks to the Venice Film Festival, Kurosawa
and Mizoguchi, then Kobayashi (Ningen no joken) were discovered; at that point further recognition was
obtained at [the] Cannes [Film Festival] (Harakiri; Kwaidan)’ (Tessier 2008: 70-71).
33
‘All my films, from a certain time on, are about power, about struggling against authority. That became my
main theme. That’s what The Human Condition is about and Harakiri of course… and Samurai Rebellion as
well. I was opposed to the abuse of power. This was true of my own life in the military. I resisted militarism
and that whole system of military power. But everything then was so rigidly controlled. We didn’t dare speak
out. It was only after the war that we could openly address this’ (Masaki Kobayashi in Zwerin, 1994).
34
‘Composition, camera movement, action and sound all combine to make a film equivalent of the highest
form of martial art. The way in which the combatants face off against each other, hardly moving for long
moments, is a near-perfect expression of the concept that a fight is won before the sword has left the scabbard
– physical action is superseded by mental conflict’ (Tucker 1973: 100).
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