Nubes flotantes

Hideko Takamine and Masayuki Mori had an affair in Indo-China during the Second World War. Now they have returned to a conquered Japan, he to his wife and she to nothing. But they still love each other, although she more than he.

The idea of a woman sacrificing herself for a man, unworthy though he be -- as all men are -- in a "He'll be sorry when I'm dead!" mood, is certainly not unique to Japanese cinema, although Western culture tends to tack on a "Reader, I married him" happy ending. Even so, I often blink and tell myself "I give them six weeks." Either that, or it's MarySue fanfiction of the bleariest sort.

In short, this strikes me as what used to be called shopgirl fiction, piffle, and unworthy of Naruse, whose narratives of downtrodden women suffering in a misogynistic Japan speak of real problems, real anguish. Yes, he gave this movie his usual attention to detail. Yes, Hideko Takamine gives one of her sterling performances, and yes, Masayuki Mori gives a performance that, like many a Naruse film, smacks less of sympathy for the downtrodden than misandry. But piffle is piffle, and it's only by remembering that film is first and foremost commercial art, that this makes sense; it's a shopgirl movie from a novel by Fumiko Hayashi (1903-1951).

She was born the daughter of a poor peddler -- somehow "poor" is always attached to the noun, as if we think of guys who have to tramp hither and yon to sell their cheap wares, as eccentric millionaires. She tried to commit suicide on several occasions. By the end of the Second World War, she was Japan's top novelist; government-sponsored trips to China in which she reported that things were great kept her in the public eye. This was the fifth novel of hers that Naruse had made into a movie, and those are also highly regarded. I like the ones I've seen a lot, particularly MESHED.

This one, however, is shopgirl piffle, even though it is shopgirl piffle of the highest order.

Ot the three senior directors who dominated the golden age of Japanese cinema, Mikio Naruse is the least known in the West. This could be partly due to the fact that unlike his contemporaries, Mizoguchi and Ozu, his cinematic language was more conventional and less innovative. And yet, if one looks long and hard, it becomes possible to identify stylistic trademarks that could be uniquely his, characters that are forever walking and interiors that are often shot from the centre of a room looking towards a corner. The very title is a metaphor for characters that are drifting their lives away with very little sense of purpose. The tragic couple, Yukiko and Kengo, who met in French Indo-China during the second world war when they were engaged on a forestry project find themselves drifting when they meet up again in a post-war Japan soured with defeat and despair. Generally when we see them they are walking, often through urban landscapes of a Tokyo desolate and scarred by the immediate past. They are always on the move in the manner almost of characters in a road movie to wherever they can travel, be it to a sad holiday resort out of season or a remote island drenched by rain that hardly ever stops. But their relationship is doomed partly because whatever passion they may feel for one another is always curiously out of sync with each other's. Their personalities are also deeply flawed to the extent that neither is able to cope with the social disadvantages of being part of a defeated nation. It has been said that defeat left many professional Japanese men feeling emotionally emasculated. This is certainly true of Kengo. As for Yukika, she has none of the stoicism of Mizoguchi's long suffering female protagonists. Dissatisfaction with her lot has left her whingeing with self pity. ""Floating Clouds" is a deeply pessimistic film in a way that Kurosawa's "The Silent Duel", which deals with a pair of lovers living through the similar period of the immediate aftermath of war, is not. Ultimately Kurosawa's characters come to terms with misfortune in a way that presages a future of some hope. Both films no doubt reflect their directors' widely different temperaments.

If you're looking for a movie that deals with clingy relationships, then Floating Clouds is without a doubt a movie that fits the bill to a T. Directed by Naruse Mikio and based upon the novel by Fumiko Hayashi, the female character in the movie will bring back memories of those who have had to deal with such stifling clinging, and well, for those who do act as such, a stark and accurate portrayal that would be akin to holding up a mirror and looking at oneself.

Hideko Takamine put up a commendable, if not personally what I deem as a remarkably irritating performance as Yukiko Koda, a woman perhaps with little self-esteem and respect, who decided to sacrifice an entire forest for one singular tree. Being sent to Indochina during WWII, she chances upon Kengo Tomioka (Masayuki Mori), and while he seemed to be prim and proper, and not giving her a second glance, soon they fall in love with each other, one despite having a wife back home, and the other, knowingly being the other woman.

But when the war ends and they get repatriated back to Japan, she looks him up, only to discover that he will not leave his wife, nor to rekindle their passion started in a foreign land. To make things worse, she discovers he's quite the cad, and to compound the problem, her insecurities and her paranoia makes you wonder why she can't afford to sever ties. It's one thing being made to suffer from unrequited love, but it's another if you are made to suffer deliberately, and bear witness to the insincerity of the other party. Running slightly over 2 hours, it does take its time to showcase the sorry state that Yukiko undergoes.

You can't really find fault with Naruse Mikio's direction of the movie - the handling of the narrative structure in the first act was deft, with the transition of time seamless, and the actors do their job to allow you to connect with their characters. However, like I mentioned, perhaps Yukiko Koda did such a fine job, that for me I found her to be a tad too irritating, even for my liking.

I absolutely love this film... in fact it is my favourite film. It's hard therefore to come to terms with some of the less than stellar reviews here, although ultimately we all have differing tastes and I'd be the first to admit that this is not for folk who require lots of action or who are intolerant of romantic drama. However I would argue that it is a film of considerable depth and even importance. In Japan, this film has long sat in the "Kinema Junpo" list of greatest movies of the twentieth century... at number 3, beaten only by Ozu's "Tokyo Story" and Kurosawa's "Seven Samurai".

The director, Mikio Naruse, is often referred to as the "other" great director of the postwar "golden age" of Japanese cinema, alongside Ozu, Kurosawa and Mizoguchi. His films are emphatically not for action junkies, being closest in pace and themes to those of Yasujiro Ozu, although lacking Ozu's distinctive flair for visual composition. They are however characterised by what is often referred to as "naturalistic pessimism", in which their usually female protagonists generally engage in an ultimately futile battle against the hand that fate has dealt them. So, another demographic that will not enjoy his work are optimists. Most of his films are in closed domestic or "water trade" (hospitality) scenarios and focussed relentlessly but fatalistically on familial dysfunction, together with the material imperatives of money and it's scarcity.

"Floating Clouds", or "Ukigumo", is however the one Naruse film that has managed to appeal to a wider audience than most of his work.

On the surface, this is simply a romantic melodrama involving very flawed human beings.. but one which is rooted in the Japanese experience of conquest, war, defeat and occupation. It powerfully conveys the grim realities of the occupation years, but also hints at colonial guilt and the emotional costs of national defeat. As in all Naruse films, money and material hardships are never far from the focus.. but into this is this... well, love story. Or hate story. Or tale of self-loathing. It is an adaptation of a novel by Fumiko Hayashi, who appears to have shared Naruse's pessimism about life, since the director adapted several of her stories for the screen and even made a filmic biography of her ("A Wanderer's Notebook", aka "Her Lonely Lane", 1962).

This film has a far more open feeling than one usually gets with Naruse. There is more outdoor shooting and a far wider variety of sets. Ranging from the humid jungles of "Indo China" (Vietnam) through a cold and ruined Tokyo to a Southern seaport on Kyushu (Kagoshima) and a rain drenched island on the edge of the archipelago, there is no more peripatetic Naruse film. There are more actors too, although the focus never strays from the two principals, "Yukiko" (Hideko Takamine) and "Tomioka" (Masayuki Mori).

A huge part of this movie's appeal lies in the performances of Takamine and Mori. Hideko Takamine was one of the three greatest mid-century female Japanese actors, alongside Setsuko Hara and Kinuyo Tanaka, and enjoyed an extraordinary level of affection from the public over a career that began as a very young child in the 1920s and ended in the late 1970s. Here, she is magnificent.... it is simply hard to believe that what you are watching is "acting". Every feeling she displays.. and there are many.. is utterly visceral and totally believable... while Mori, unquestionably one of the most accomplished of Japan's male cinema actors, also gives one of the greatest performances of his career.

I read that Takamine was originally reluctant to accept the role of "Yukiko", but Naruse's insistence has left us with what is undoubtedly one of the greatest performances in all of Japanese Cinema. She had an extraordinary facility for "silent emoting" that is best seen in her work for Naruse, and emphatically so here. Watch out for the "kiss scene", and her breathtakingly powerful yet wordless reaction.

There are some strong supporting performances as well from Daisuke Kato, Isao Yamagata and Mariko Okada, and some wonderful little vignettes that are best withheld in the interest of avoiding spoilers, but which help imbue the film with it's powerful sense of time and place. Like Kurosawa's "Rashomon" this film deploys "back and forth" time shifting to tell a tale that largely takes place in the immediate postwar period, but also harks back to a colonial experience prior to Japan's defeat.

It is to my eyes a fabulous tale, enacted to the highest standard, and within the context of the immediate postwar moment. It holds a special place in the affections of many Japanese precisely because of the exemplary melding of history and emotion. However, even though this is as frenetic and action packed as a Naruse film ever gets, it still demands, and rewards, patience. These films were made for a more reflective and less distracted audience than the typical modern cinema crowd, and that includes those of Japan. By the second half of the 1960s, the "golden age" was over, with the film-making of the old masters like Naruse seen as too slow and anachronistic. What a legacy though.... If you have seen and enjoyed "Tokyo Story" (aka "the greatest Japanese film ever made"), then try this.... More melodramatic, certainly, less distinctive visually, but with an epic scale, always measured and beautifully acted... and speaking far more directly to the long national agony of Japan under militarism and occupation.

"Ukigumo" covers a considerable span of time and numerous locations. It tells the story of a young woman (Hideko Takamine) who served in Japan's forest service in Indochina during WW2, and fell in love with a (married) co-worker (Masayuki Mori) while there. After the war, she returns to Japan, completely impoverished, and finds her lover (more or less) comfortably re-established in his family and uninterested in fulfilling the idle promises he made during the war. While Mori is only willing to dally half-heartedly with her (as well as younger prettier women), Takamine remains obsessed with him. Takamine and Mori do a fine job. I found the story effective enough, albeit a bit overly melodramatic. Not my favorite Naruse film, but very much worth seeing.