A
man maintaining two households ought to at least be gainfully employed.
Unfortunately, that is not the case for Kimiko Yamamoto’s deadbeat father,
Shunsaku. Yet, for the sake of social convention and her heartsick mother, she
will try to reconcile her parents. Even though it is hard to say no to Yamamoto,
things still do not go according to her plans in Mikio Naruse’s breakout hit Wife! Be Like a Rose! which screens as
part of Japan Speaks Out, MoMA’s current
survey of early Japanese talking pictures.
When
Shunsaku absconded to set up house with the scandalous former geisha Oyuki in
the provinces, his family was appalled, especially his judgmental brother.
Nevertheless, the plucky Kimiko Yamamoto more or less supports herself and her
tragic-poetry writing mother on her office salary. Everyone is convinced old
man Yamamoto will eventually do the right thing and come home. However, when her
father never calls on his real family while visiting Tokyo for business,
Yamamoto resolves to take matters into her own hands.
On
a practical level, Yamamoto needs her father to finalize her engagement with
her junior salaryman fiancé. She is also tired of watching her mother mope around
the house. Originally, she plans to frog-march her father home from his den of
vice, but the reality of his second home is much different than what she envisioned.
Instead of a gold-digging harlot, Oyuki is the long-suffering mother of her
half-sister and half-brother, who all live under much more impoverished conditions
than her and her mother.
Rose is a gentle film,
but it is chocked full of shrewd social commentary. It is fascinating to
compare Kimiko Yamamoto, a career woman who is consciously navigating familial,
social, and gender roles in an increasingly modernized world, with typical parts
assigned to Hollywood actresses in the 1930s. Okay, so she is also cute. In
fact, lead actress Sachiko Chiba was Naruse’s fiancée and chief muse at this
time.
Their
relationship would not last, but her performance holds up undeniably well. She
is forceful and flirty, but also extraordinarily subtle and sensitive. It is
rather remarkable to see her Yamamoto come to terms with her parents’ faults
and failings. The dignity and fragility of Yuriko Hanabusa’s Oyuki is also
quite touching.
