Ninjô kami fûsen

Master filmmaker Sadao Yamanaka died at 28 years of age during the early 20th Century Imperial Japanese wars, but he left us with this beautiful ode to the common folk, living in a poor street in Edo (today's Tokyo).

Before watching an old film, I always worry that it will be antiquated and boring, but it feels modern instead. Why? Because people were not very different back then, and good naturalist acting shows them as our neighbours. Portentous or stilted acting is not exclusive of black and white movies, but technology and rapid editing techniques masks the inadequacies of contemporary directors. The characters in "Humanity..." are not actually modern, they're real.

Much is implied instead of shown, but what appears on screen is entertaining and depressing at the same time. This slice of life tells a simple story of low class people confronting their social superiors and trying to get ahead in life, while maintaining their honor and their sense of agency.

Recommended.

This is a brilliant film. A story about a poverty stricken part of Edo (Tokyo) in the feudal era of Japan, the film concerns itself with its inhabitants, all of which are superbly written and realized. The best role went to Nakamura Kanemon as Shinzu The Barber. His character is contrary, proud and kind of fearless. The depiction of poor but somewhat brutish samurai is also greatly written. The story begins with a suicide and while is generally an unhappy film there is a bit of dark comedy in it. One of the saddest things was this was director Yamanaka Sadeo's swan song, as he died in the war shortly thereafter. Sadder still is that most of his films have been lost, but you still have this film, an utterly mesmerizing tale of the poor who somehow accept their fate and do not make it a millstone around their neck. See this, its a deserved classic.

This time even having a Ronin no fight at all, the little gem from Japanese tale that takes place a slum area on late 18th Century at Edo (Current Tokyo) where several sad happening are ongoing, a veteran Samurai committed suicide, the landlord local demands an affordable funeral, however all neighbors require five bottles of sake to drink during the long night veiling the body, meanwhile at daylight enters an old fishing vendor speaking louder continuously at street bothering the bystanders, also an unemployed Ronin has a letter from his death father to his former friend that today is powerful chief of the whole area exploitation the forbidden gambling, offering safeguard for pawnshop, dealing a proper marriage with a rich clan among others misdemeanours which became he rich man.

Actually the Ronin never got a meeting at your home with the Chief, suddenly he finds him at street the lousy man flees from conversation saying that is too busy now and asking to Ronin that will receive next morning at home, sheer curling in the early morning the tough doorman coming back saying that the chief never know him anywhere, then the heartbroken Ronin goes back at his poorest home, there his suffered wife making paper balloons to help in the costing to survive under hopeless condition, the proud Ronin said that the chief already got the his father's letter and soon as possible he will got the job, in fact he almost begged to the callous Boss.

Another meaningful fact is about a barber man that is making secretly a gabling in the area, aware that the chief faces him to didn't it under any means, or shall be subject a hard rebuke of their minions, thus as payback the bold barber kidnaped a young woman that the chief was addressing a profitable marriage with a richest clan, all this screw up his plans.

This little great picture made in late thirties became a cult even in the westerns places where too much cherished by the critics and cinephiles, a tender a sorrowful story about poverty, humbleness and hopelessness, a sort tragic-comic feature!!

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First watch: 2022 / Source: DVD / How many: 1 / Rating: 8.5.

Filmed in conjunction with the radical Zenshin-za theatre group, Humanity and Paper Balloons, Sadao Yamanaka's tragi-comic tribute to the poor and working classes in the 18th century during the Edo period is a treasure of world cinema. A contemporary of Ozu, Naruse, and Mizoguchi, Yamanaka made 22 films before his death in Manchuria in 1938 at the age of 29 but sadly only three have survived. Humanity and Paper Balloons is a jidaigeki or historical period film whose power lies not only in the social realist message that depicts the hardships endured by the poor but in its delineation of character, its humor, and the beautiful cinematography that captures the claustrophobic nature of the village in which the story takes place.

Based on a Kabuki play known as Shinza the Barber, the film opens with an unseen suicide by a disgraced samurai who hangs himself out of desperation. While the death is being investigated, local tenants hold a wake (drinking the landlord's sake) that turns into a evening of merriment, ostensibly to cleanse the evil that lingers in the village. As the party proceeds, Yazuka boss Yataguro and his gang look for Shinza (Kanemon Nakamura), a hairdresser, to exact revenge for the gambling parties he has sponsored in their territory. Shrugging off the danger he faces, Shinza, an appealing but naive character, continues to hold gambling parties and pushes the envelope even further by kidnapping the daughter of the wealthy merchant Shirokoya to cause the local bosses to lose face.

Meanwhile a poor Ronin named Matajuro Unno (Chojuro Kawarasaki) desperately wants a meeting with Mori, a samurai official, who knew his father and who he feels owes him a debt of gratitude but he is continuously rebuffed. As Unno's attempts to meet and talk with Mori fail, his wife (Shizue Yamagishi) ekes out a living by making paper balloons and all of the strands of the film come together at the end with tragic consequences. Although the story is bleak, the film is lightened considerably by its humor and intelligent interplay of character.

Like Hirokazu Koreeda in his 2004 film Hana Yori mo Naho, Yamanaka masterfully challenges the legend of the samurai as heroes and shows how the Bushido code of honor was ultimately empty of compassion and common sense. Humanity and Paper Balloons, true to its title, is a film of deep and abiding humanity that has finally been restored by Eureka Entertainment's Masters of Cinema Series to its proper place among the all time film classics.

Humanity and Paper Balloons is a jidaigeki period drama that subtly defuses the myth surrounding the samurai class through a poor ronin samurai who gets desperate and abets a kidnapping. While the protagonist of the film, a hairdresser, through his cunning tries to earn respect and climb up the societal ladder.

The movie is set in the dying period of the Tokugawa era. This movie comes at an age where jidaigeki movies used to glorify the samurai class which was the highest social class above the farmer and craftsmen while merchants occupied the lowest strata. Humanity and Paper Balloons spits on the existing fascist trend of showing unreal themes of majestic samurai warriors valiantly fighting through their heroic life and never tainting their honor. The movie tries to capture the darker realities of the acclaimed peaceful Edo period which, although started in the 1600s with rapid economic growth, strict social order and popular enjoyment of arts and culture, decayed through the years and ended in 1868. It does this by showcasing how samurai warriors can be corrupt, low class merchants with money and mafia can be influential and powerful and a poor and low-class person like a barber can be more crafty and honorable.

The plot opens with the suicide of a disgraced poor Samurai. It portrays a sordid world where the humiliated suffering samurais now mingle with the lower-classes and small-time merchants, who are at the mercy of stuffy corrupt officials. Mori, a high ranking samurai who turned his back on his fellow ronins indulges in defaced practices. Merchants employ thugs to police the slum apart from the inept regular police. A low class hair dresser takes up the central role while trying to gain respect in the society and kidnaps a pawnbroker's daughter who was set to be married to a high class samurai family.

Like all Yamanaka's films, Humanity and Paper Balloons is a jidaigeki, but one poles apart from the majestic spectacle of, say, Akira Kurosawa's later works for this very same studio that were made after the war. The film is deeply pessimistic, insisting that life in feudal Japan was hellish and short for those at the foot of the social ladder.