She Was Like a Wild Chrysanthemum

She Was Like a Wild Chrysanthemum
野菊の如き君なりき
Nogiku no gotoki kimi nariki
Directed by Keisuke Kinoshita
Screenplay by Keisuke Kinoshota (screenplay)
Saicho Ito (novel)
Cinematography Hiroshi Kusuda
Production
company
Shochiku films
Release dates
  • 1955 (Japan)
Country Japan
Language Japanese

She Was Like a Wild Chrysanthemum (野菊の如き君なりき Nogiku no gotoki kimi nariki), also known as You Were Like a Wild Chrysanthemum or My First Love Affair, is a Japanese film directed by Keisuke Kinoshita which was initially released in 1955. It is based on a novel by Saicho Ito.[1][2][3] The film is set in the Meiji period.[4] The story tells of the forbidden romance between teenaged cousins Masao and Tamiko.[4] The lovers were also inhibited by a marriage arranged by her family for Tamiko and Masao needing to go away to school.[3] The story is essentially a flashback as remembered by the 73 year old Masao, played by Chishū Ryū, as he rides a boat back to his home village where they first fell in love.[1][2][3][5] The flashback scenes are filmed using and oval-shaped mask typically associated with silent films.[3][4] According to Alexander Jacoby, this masking gives the film "an appropriately nostalgic tone."[4] Film critic Donald Richie describes the film style as representing "Meiji daguerrotypes."[2]

Jacoby rates She Was Like a Wild Chrysanthemum to be "among the most purely moving of Japanese films," despite its "occasional naivety."[4] He attributes this particularly to Kinoshota's "simple techniques," including "judicious choice of camera position," and to the excellent performances.[4] Richie regards the film as one of Kinoshita's "most successful" in his later style.[2] Joseph L. Anderson praises the film's photography, particularly the "rich blacks" and Kinoshita's "evocation of [the] area."[3] Jacek Kloiowski, et al, regard the film as "one of the most sincere and purest films of its type in Japanese cinema," noting that it marks a return to "pastoral lyricism" for Kinoshota after focusing his films on social issues for the previous few years.[5]

Cinematographer Hiroshi Kusuda won the Mainichi Film Award for cinematography in 1956 for his work on She Was Like a Wild Chrysanthemum and another Kinoshita–directed film, The Tattered Wings.[6] He also won the Blue Ribbon Award for cinematography for the same two films.[7]

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 "She Was Like a Wild Chrysanthemum". IMDB. Retrieved 2014-09-21.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 Richie, D. (2012). A Hundred Years of Japanese Film. Kodansha. p. 142. ISBN 9781568364391.
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 Anderson, J.L. (1982). The Japanese Film: Art and Industry. Pinceton University Press. pp. 279, 373. ISBN 9780691007922.
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 4.5 Jacoby, A. (2008). A Critical Handbook of Japanese Film Directors. Stone Bridge Press. ISBN 9781933330532.
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 Klinowski et al. (2012). Feature Cinema in the 20th Century: Volume Two: 1951-1963: a Comprehensive Guide. Planet RGB. ISBN 9781624075650.
  6. ↑ "Mainichi Film Concours Awards for 1956". IMDB. Retrieved 2014-09-21.
  7. ↑ "Blue Ribbon Awards for 1956". IMDB. Retrieved 2014-09-21.