O Quimono Escarlate

I was truly surprised by this movie - I expected a basic potboiler, with a random collection of Japanese and/or Chinese stereotypes... but what I got was a potboiler (sorry, the plot's pretty basic) AND an interesting set of insights into Japanese-American culture. I'm trying to picture a 1959 audience attending this movie... were they expecting an Oriental thriller? Or perhaps a pseudo-noir detective movie? (I'm also trying to resist comparing this to the last half-dozen episodes of Law & Order I've seen)

Meanwhile, this movie has no sense of "outsider's look at foreigners," no sense of "those people are strange," just a lot of "here's what they do, and here's what their daily life includes." All wrapped up in... a B-grade movie. But that just means that the cultural pieces lift up the otherwise-average quality of the rest of the movie!

Not like I want to lecture all of you...but this film does a bit more than it's being given credit for. In fact, it engages with the nature of image and illusion and its relation to reality. Maybe it doesn't do this in the profoundest of ways, but this is as proper a subject for film-making as can be. Hitchcock's Rear Window is the obvious masterpiece in this respect, but if you take your attention (or "gaze" if you prefer) off of the story or the genre of this film for a second, you can't avoid the fact that every scene has this at its core. The film is filled with Westerners who have a fixation or fascination with otherness as represented, in this case, by "orientalism". They are experts in Asian art and martial arts; they are infusing their work and life with exoticism.They have a curatorial approach to life; they are voyeurs, to some degree. Painters and painting - imagemaking - plays a key role in the film.The Japanese - American (Nisei) detective Joe attempts to bridge the gap that exists between himself and Christine through a tongue-tied analysis of what is missing in her canvas - what is visible by its absence. He also attempts to figure out whether his thinking is more "Asian" or "American" in its nature. This is symbolized by his playing a Japanese folk song on the most Western of instruments, the well-tempered piano. He sees himself as a hybrid. He is aware of the fact that he sees the world through a combination of several possible filters. The line "You only saw what you wanted to see" has key significance in this film,underscoring as it does several key scenes. By the use of the word "you", it also implicates the VIEWER of the film. The viewer of a film only sees what he/she wants to see: notice, for example, how this whole aspect of this film, which I consider essential, has gone unmentioned in all the other commentaries! Joe wants Christine to see him for himself, fearful of her taking the curatorial or voyeuristic approach to their interracial relationship - Deleuze's famous line "when you are lost in the dream of the other, you are screwed" comes to mind - and yet Joe forgets that he sees HIMSELF as fragmented, made up of parts.

The stripper's dying in the street is accompanied by raucous stripper music and is immediately contrasted with her lascivious life-size representation above the marquee. The life force and escapism represented there is contrasted with the funky facts of life and death. Her manager's description of the Asian - influenced act which she was planning uses the language of aesthetics to describe a piece of cutting-edge trash much as the film we are watching operates both on the level of a program-filling potboiler and an examination of personal tropes. All this having been said, I will admit that, having recently re-seen Pickup On South Street, I was a bit spoiled by the earlier film. Neither Glenn Corbett nor Victoria Shaw seem to inhabit their roles adequately enough. I understand that Fuller films are not about "acting" per se, but still...And Sam Leavitt is no Joe McDonald (cinematography). I loved the denouement's taking place within the fast-moving Nisei parade, but this is a real Wells (Lady from Shanghai) via Hitchcock (39 Steps) moment. And they both did it better, for what it's worth. Still, I love Fuller and his vision. I am glad his work now receives serious attention although paradoxically, like a true example of Heisenberg's principle, such work seems to function much better outside of the self-conscious, self-reflexive world of "art". Fuller is like Anna Lee's character Mac: he can only paint his epic masterpieces in the back room of a sleazy bar.

Sam Fuller directed "The Crimson Kimono," starring Glenn Corbett, James Shigeta, Victoria Shaw and Anna Lee, and this 1959 film is not your usual detective noir. Corbett and Shigeta are Charlie Bancroft and Joe Kojaku, buddies from the Korean war and now partners in the LA Police Department, who investigate the death of a stripper. In the course of that investigation, they meet a beautiful artist (Shaw) and both men fall for her; she in turn falls for the gentle and intelligent Joe. This tests the relationship of the two men, and when Joe sees Charlie's reaction, he assumes it comes from Charlie's latent racism.

This is an odd film, not as good or as well done as Fuller's Pickup on South Street, but good nonetheless. Part of its success is due to the persona and performance of James Shigeta, for a time one of the biggest Asian-American stars ever. "The Crimson Kimono" was the first feature film for both Shigeta and Corbett, and they handle their assignments well. Fifty years later, Shigeta is still working; Corbett worked steadily until his death in 1993. Anna Lee is on hand giving a vigorous performance as an alcoholic artist; the late Victoria Shaw is beautiful but doesn't register much as Chris, the love interest of both men.

There are a couple of problems with this ambitious script, one being Joe's claim that he had never experienced racism. That's impossible if he was in California when World War II broke out; it's a naive statement he wouldn't have made. The other problem is that all of the love connections seem instantaneous, though that seems to be a very "noir" thing. Nevertheless, the story holds interest, the performances are good, the atmosphere authentic, and Sam Fuller always has something to say, if only we'd listen

Very provocative movie, for the time that it was released in 1959, about a love triangle between two L.A detectives, one white and the other Japanese/American. With a young white female art student whom their protecting from an unknown killer.

After strip-tease artist Sugar Torch, Gloria Pall, finishes her act on stage she's shot at by an unknown assailant. Running for her life outside the theater on the crowded street, with nothing on but her underclothes, she's gunned down and killed. With Detctives Charles Bancroft & Joe Kojaku,Glenn Corbett & James Shigeta, put on the case they find in Sugar Torch's dressing room a painting of a her in a crimson kimono. The painting that the killer also shot a bullet through in anger. It was as if he knew who painted it.

The detectives track down the artist who painted the portrait to an art student at the University of Southern California named Christine Downs, Victoria Shaw. Christine, or Chris, tells Charles and Joe that the painting of Sugar Torch was commissioned by her boyfriend. A man who called himself Hansel, Neyle Morrow. The two L.A cops besides providing 24 hours around the clock protection of Chris from Sugar Torch's killer, who just missed shooting and killing her, go out on the streets canvassing the neighborhood, mostly L.A's Little Tokyo. Looking to find him and see what the people there know about Sugar's murder.

Both's Charles and Joe have been the best of friends since the Korean War. Joe saved Charles life on the battlefield by not only dragging back a seriously injured Charles to the safety of a MASH unit but also by donating a paint of his badly needed blood in order to keep him alive while he was being operated on. It never bothered them that they came from different backgrounds and are of different races all these years. Now, with Chris coming into their lives, things are about the change dramatically.

"Crimson Komino" goes from a police murder drama to a love triangle half-way through the movie. The All-American rough and tumble Charles Bancroft falls in love with ,the American as apple pie, Chris Downs only to have her fall for the more sensitive and artistic Japanese/American Joe Kojaku. Whom Chris, being an artist herself, has far more in common with. This leads Joe to feel very guilty and in a way embarrassed for stealing his best friends girlfriend who's not Japanese like himself.

As all this is happening the two cops begin to track down Hansel but the pent-up emotions that Joe is keeping inside him begins to come to the surface. In a Karate contest sponsored by the Little Tokyo neighborhood, that both Charles & Joe are entered in, leads to Joe almost killing Charles. This happens when Joe forgets the rules and smashed Charles head in after he was told to stop and back off by the contest referee.

In the dressing room Joe confesses that his being in love with Chris, and she with him,has made it impossible for him to be his partner Joe tells a shocked and confused Charles that he's turning in his badge since Joe feels that he can't do his job as a L.A policemen anymore. It's then when the truth comes out about Hansel who it turned out was involved in a similar situation and what he had, or had not, to do with Sugar Torch's murder. That put things into sharp focus for both Charles and Joe to not only who the killer is but why their sudden dislike and antagonism, towards each other over Chris, was nothing more then unfounded and irrational hate and ideas. Ideas that they had deep inside their minds that the racism,of both of them, blew way out of proportion.

"The Crimson Komino" is another hit, by cult director Samuel Fuller, that dared to show to the American public in 1959 what an inter-racial relationship can do to both parties who are not at all ready for it. Somewhat like the movie "Sayonara" but far more explosive and penetrating. And at the same time with a much happier ending.

If you can, and it would definitely be as rare a chance as I had recently, try and see Samuel Fuller's The Crimson Kimono on the big screen, preferably with a packed audience. True, some of the dialog and mannerisms of the characters end up forty-seven years later coming off as being too funny for its own good. But then again, Fuller's style here, as in the films that would follow in the 60's (and linked of course to his 50's work), is that of sensationalism yet not in a way that feels too dishonest. It's got a sharp cast of professionals, with Glenn Corbett and James Shigetta as the leads playing Detective partners who are investigating a case that somehow leads to a sort of love triangle with a witness Victoria Shaw. And Fuller is able to make the film quite entertaining with at least a few memorable moments almost in spite of the low-budget of things.

The opening sequence is, naturally for Fuller, part of the excitement and close-to-exploitation B-movie-ness of it all, as a stripper gets gunned down running away from her dressing room. Even before this we get the opening titles popping out at the screen, almost being too obvious. But to say that the film is at times leaning towards tongue-in-cheek is more of an observation than a criticism. It fits the style that some of the dialog bits are really sharp and, indeed, well-written, and that as such the actors take it not too seriously as to make it heavy-handed but not too over the top to have the audience lose interest. Indeed, one of the more interesting scenes is when Shaw and Shigeta get to talking while Corbett is out doing work, as they become connected in a way that is different than how earlier Shaw and Corbett flirted around in a cool though 'movie' kind of way.

All through this Fuller pumps up the melodrama with well-shot action (the big Korean guy getting tackled down by the detectives was maybe my favorite scene on a shamelessly enjoyable level) and enough of a kind of mix of psychology and sociology in this cross section of Japan and America. And it's interesting how he slightly improves in flipping the situation from House of Bamboo where the Japanese atmosphere wasn't as convincing. It's probably a tough find for most, and of course even rarer to get on the big-screen depending on where you're at, but it might be one of Fuller's better 'quickie' kind of movies where its 80 minute running time does just enough to make it very worthwhile in not overstaying its welcome. It's funny, thoughtful, and assured film-noir.