Blast from the Past: Mizoguchi’s Masterpiece Revisited
Kenji Mizoguchi’s Japanese period film, Sancho the Bailiff, is based on a 1915 short story of the same name by Mori Ōgai (translated as “Sanshō the Steward”).
By now, I have seen the movie just twice; the first time, mwhen the noted critic Andrew Sarris introduced it to American viewers, and the second two decades later, in trepidation. Leaving an indelible spell and the kind of magic that’s hard to rationalze in words, Sancho is one of the most devastatingly touching films I’ve ever seen (and we’re talking about thousands and thoisands of films)
Sansho the Bailiff is a jidai-geki set in late eleventh century, during the Heian period of feudal Japan.
In 1077, a virtuous governor is banished by feudal lord to a far-off Tsukushi Province. His wife, Tamaki, and children, Zushiō and Anju, are sent to live with her brother. Just before they are separated, Zushiō’s father tells him, “Without mercy, man is like a beast. Even if you are hard on yourself, be merciful to others.” He urges his son to remember his words and gives him a statuette of Kannon, the Goddess of Mercy.
In 1083, the wife and children journey to his exiled land but are tricked by a treacherous priestess. The mother is sold into prostitution in Sado and the children are sold by slave traders to a manorial estate in Tango Province, where slaves are brutalized and branded when they try to escape. The estate, protected under the Minister of the Right, is administered by the eponymous Sanshō. Sanshō’s son Tarō, the second-in-charge, is a much more humane master and convinces the children to survive before they can escape to find their mother.
The children grow to young adults at the slave camp. Anju still believes in the teachings of her father but Zushiō has repressed his humanity, becoming a brutal overseer, believing that this is the only way to survive.
At work, Anju hears a song from a new Sado slave girl which mentions her and her brother in the lyrics, leading her to believe their mother is still alive. She tries to convince Zushiō to escape but he refuses, citing lack of money.
Zushiō is ordered to take Namiji, an older woman acutely ill, out of the slave camp to die in the wilderness.
Zushiō changes his mind and asks Anju to escape with him to find their mother. Anju asks him to take Namiji with him, convincing her brother she will stay behind to distract the guards. Zushiō promises to return for Anju. However, after Zushiō’s escape, Anju commits suicide by walking into a lake, drowning herself so that she will not be tortured and forced to reveal her brother’s whereabouts.
After Zushiō escapes, he finds Tarō at an Imperial temple. Zushiō asks him to care for Namiji so that he can go to Kyoto to appeal to the Chief Advisor about the appalling slave conditions. The Chief Advisor realizes who Zushiō is after seeing his statuette of Kannon. He then Zushiō that his exiled father died the year before and offers him the post of the governor of Tango.
As Governor of Tango, Zushiō issues edict forbidding slavery on public and private grounds. Although Sanshō offers initial resistance, Zushiō orders him and his men arrested, freeing the slaves. When he looks for Anju among Sanshō’s slaves, he learns that his sister sacrificed herself for his freedom. The manor is burned down by the ex-slaves while Sanshō and his family are exiled. Zushiō resigns immediately afterwards, stating that he has done what he intended to do.
Zushiō goes to Sado for his aged mother, whom he believes is still a courtesan. Upon hearing that she died in a tsunami, he goes to the beach she is supposed to have died on. He finds a decrepit old woman sitting on the beach singing the same song he had heard before. Realizing she is his mother, he reveals his identity, but Tamaki, who has gone blind, assumes he is a trickster until he gives her the statuette of Kannon, which she recognizes by touch.
Zushiō tells her that both Anju and their father have died and apologizes for not coming for her due his governor’s post. Instead he followed his father’s proverb, choosing mercy toward others by freeing Sanshō’s slaves. He tells his mother he has been true to his father’s teachings.
Critical Status:
It is regarded as Mizoguchi’s magnum opus and one of cinema’s greatest films ever made.
The late great film critic Robin Wood called it “a strong candidate for Greatest Film Ever Made. A perfect and profound masterpiece, rivaled only by its near companion Ugetsu.”
Sansho won the Silver Lion for best direction at the 1954 Venice Film Festival, which again brought Mizoguchi to the attention of Western critics and filmmakers, after The Life of Oharu (International Award, 1952) and Ugetsu (Silver Lion, 1953).
In the BFI 2012 Sight & Sound polls, Sansho came in at 59th, with 25 critics having voted for the film. In 2022, Sight and Sound repeated the poll, and Sansho came in joint 75th place, tied with Spirited Away and Imitation of Life.
Sancho belongs to an unbroken (and unparalleled) cycle of masterpieces made by Kenji Mizoguchi, which, unfortunately, occurred shortly before his untimely death, in 1956, age 58.
About Mizoguchi
Kenji Mizoguchi (1898–1956) directed over one hundred films during his career between 1923 and 1956. His most acclaimed works include The Story of the Last Chrysanthemums (1939), The Life of Oharu (1952), Ugetsu (1953), and Sansho the Bailiff (1954).
A recurring theme of his films was the persistent oppression of women in various historical and contemporary contexts.
Alongside with with Akira Kurosawa and Yasujirō Ozu, Mizoguchi represents the height of the “Golden Age” of Japanese cinema.
Cast
Kinuyo Tanaka Tamaki
Kyōko Kagawa Anju
Eitarō Shindō Sanshō
Yoshiaki Hanayagi Zushiō
Ichirō Sugai Minister of Justice Niō
Ken Mitsuda Fujiwara no Morozane
Masahiko Tsugawa Zushiō as a Boy
Masao Shimizu Taira no Masauji
Chieko Naniwa Ubatake
Kikue Mori Priestess
Akitake Kōno Tarō
Ryōsuke Kagawa Donmyō Ritsushi
