Sansho the Bailiff (1954) directed by Kenji Mizoguchi
A couple days ago I watched Le Havre, a feel good movie that celebrates the human spirit. Today I watched Sansho the Bailiff which can almost be described in opposite, a depressing movie about human suffering and cruelty. Yet there is a certain beauty in the tragedy of the film. It is bitter, sweet, harrowing and beautiful at the same time.
The film begins with a local governor being removed from his position and exiled after standing up for peasants' rights. He takes his exile in stride, believing his stance is honorable and right. For this he is beloved and admired by his subjects and held in the highest regard by his family that he must leave behind. He tells his son Zushio to remember these words, "Without mercy a man is not a human being," and "Even if you hard on yourself, be merciful to others." Fast forward to sometime later where Zushio, his sister Anju, and mother Tamaki are wandering the countryside alone, their days as a noble family long behind them.
In a jarring scene, the mother and children are separated by slave traders. The scene is exceptionally shot on the shore of a lake capturing all of the emotions of a family ripped apart as the boat that separates them slowly drifts away, a truly tragic and heartbreaking moment. The kids are then sold off to a slave camp run by the ruthless Sansho who is so heartless that he brands any slave that tries to runaway on the forehead. The labor camp is harsh and unforgiving and tests the children's strength and belief in their father's words. Ten years pass and Zushio and Anju have grown into young adults. Zushio's heart has hardened accepting the cruelty of the world around him while Anju still clings on to her humanity. I don't want to just do a plot summary, so I'll just say Zushio eventually remembers his father's words, but not before encountering more tragedy and hardship along the way.
SPOILER ALERT:
In the film's most famous scene, in order to ensure Zushio can escape, Anju commits suicide by drowning herself in a lake. (This family seems to have bad luck when it comes to bodies of water.) Normally I wouldn't even bother giving away such an important plot point, but the scene is very elegantly shot, almost dreamlike, which makes the tragedy all the more poignant. It is interesting that we don't actually see Anju dip under the water. She walks into the water slowly building up the tension and the heartache, then the camera ever so briefly cuts away to the old woman watching her and when it cuts back Anju is gone, leaving only ripples in the water behind. One moment you're here and the next you're gone, pretty much a perfectly executed scene.
END SPOILER
In reading critics' thoughts on the film, they all talk about the cinematography of the film which looked quite good, the two scenes I mentioned as prime examples. However there are some things I found really interesting that seems almost impossible for a casual viewer like myself to catch. In Ebert's essay on the film, he points out the visual poetry of some shots. He writes, "Throughout the film, Mizoguchi closely observes the rules of classic cinema. Movements to the left suggests backward in time, to the right, forward. Diagonals move in the direction of their sharpest angle. Upward movement is hopeful, downward ominous. By moving from upper left to lower right, they are descending into an unpromising future." Maybe this is standard in "classic cinema" but I found this to be very impressive. I had no idea of the level of detail that goes into how shots are composed.
The film is a hard watch because there are simply no light moments to look forward to. Even the ending which is bittersweet is hard to take in because of all the suffering that the characters endured to get to that point. It's a little strange and perhaps hypocritical that I talked about how I didn't really connect with The Grapes of Wrath in my main argument against its greatness because I didn't necessarily connect with Sansho the Bailiff either (in that I wasn't crying my eyes out) but I seemed to appreciate and understand its message more. I wouldn't go as far as to say it is an emotionally devastating experience as some critics have written but it is definitely a powerful one that leaves a lasting impression.
Grade: A-
A couple days ago I watched Le Havre, a feel good movie that celebrates the human spirit. Today I watched Sansho the Bailiff which can almost be described in opposite, a depressing movie about human suffering and cruelty. Yet there is a certain beauty in the tragedy of the film. It is bitter, sweet, harrowing and beautiful at the same time.
The film begins with a local governor being removed from his position and exiled after standing up for peasants' rights. He takes his exile in stride, believing his stance is honorable and right. For this he is beloved and admired by his subjects and held in the highest regard by his family that he must leave behind. He tells his son Zushio to remember these words, "Without mercy a man is not a human being," and "Even if you hard on yourself, be merciful to others." Fast forward to sometime later where Zushio, his sister Anju, and mother Tamaki are wandering the countryside alone, their days as a noble family long behind them.
In a jarring scene, the mother and children are separated by slave traders. The scene is exceptionally shot on the shore of a lake capturing all of the emotions of a family ripped apart as the boat that separates them slowly drifts away, a truly tragic and heartbreaking moment. The kids are then sold off to a slave camp run by the ruthless Sansho who is so heartless that he brands any slave that tries to runaway on the forehead. The labor camp is harsh and unforgiving and tests the children's strength and belief in their father's words. Ten years pass and Zushio and Anju have grown into young adults. Zushio's heart has hardened accepting the cruelty of the world around him while Anju still clings on to her humanity. I don't want to just do a plot summary, so I'll just say Zushio eventually remembers his father's words, but not before encountering more tragedy and hardship along the way.
SPOILER ALERT:
In the film's most famous scene, in order to ensure Zushio can escape, Anju commits suicide by drowning herself in a lake. (This family seems to have bad luck when it comes to bodies of water.) Normally I wouldn't even bother giving away such an important plot point, but the scene is very elegantly shot, almost dreamlike, which makes the tragedy all the more poignant. It is interesting that we don't actually see Anju dip under the water. She walks into the water slowly building up the tension and the heartache, then the camera ever so briefly cuts away to the old woman watching her and when it cuts back Anju is gone, leaving only ripples in the water behind. One moment you're here and the next you're gone, pretty much a perfectly executed scene.
END SPOILER
In reading critics' thoughts on the film, they all talk about the cinematography of the film which looked quite good, the two scenes I mentioned as prime examples. However there are some things I found really interesting that seems almost impossible for a casual viewer like myself to catch. In Ebert's essay on the film, he points out the visual poetry of some shots. He writes, "Throughout the film, Mizoguchi closely observes the rules of classic cinema. Movements to the left suggests backward in time, to the right, forward. Diagonals move in the direction of their sharpest angle. Upward movement is hopeful, downward ominous. By moving from upper left to lower right, they are descending into an unpromising future." Maybe this is standard in "classic cinema" but I found this to be very impressive. I had no idea of the level of detail that goes into how shots are composed.
The film is a hard watch because there are simply no light moments to look forward to. Even the ending which is bittersweet is hard to take in because of all the suffering that the characters endured to get to that point. It's a little strange and perhaps hypocritical that I talked about how I didn't really connect with The Grapes of Wrath in my main argument against its greatness because I didn't necessarily connect with Sansho the Bailiff either (in that I wasn't crying my eyes out) but I seemed to appreciate and understand its message more. I wouldn't go as far as to say it is an emotionally devastating experience as some critics have written but it is definitely a powerful one that leaves a lasting impression.
Grade: A-
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