Pictures from the Floating World | |  | 24 February – 18 April 2010
Wednesdays & Sundays 2pm
Wednesdays 7.15pm (except 7 April, 6pm)
Domain Theatre, Lower Level 3
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Note: For Wednesday night and Sunday screenings, tickets are issued at the Domain Theatre 1 hour prior to commencement. Arriving early is recommended as seating is limited to 320 and cannot be guaranteed. Film series screening in conjunction with Hymn to beauty: the art of Utamaro. At the beginning of the 17th century, the Tokugawa warrior clan unified Japan and established a strong government. With the peace and stability of Tokugawa rule came economic prosperity, and the arts flourished. When the samurai ruled Japan, merchants, craftsmen and common people became increasingly affluent, yet the opportunities for social advancement were very limited. The Kabuki theatre and the licensed entertainment districts became the focal points of popular art and literature.
Life in the entertainment districts became known as the ukiyo or 'floating world', whose fleeting pleasures were to be enjoyed for their own sake. Ukiyo-e were the 'pictures of the floating world', a genre of woodblock prints and paintings that illustrated the world of impermanency – in particular, the sophisticated milieu of Edo (Tokyo). Artists such as Utamaro frequented the pleasure districts – the theatres, restaurants, tea-houses, geisha and courtesans. They created ukiyo-e prints which advertised the world of entertainment: theatre performances, popular actors and idols, brothels and beautiful tea-house girls.
The Pictures from the floating world film series presents classic cinema by some of Japan's most significant directors. The films depict life in the great urban centres in the Tokugawa period and the floating world of beautiful women, artists, courtesans, actors, landscapes and samurai warriors.Major sponsors  
- Wednesday 24 February 2pm & 7.15pm
Sunday 28 February 2pm
Sakuran
Dir: Mika Ninagawa (2006)
111 mins 35mm Colour Rated R (unclassified)
Japanese with English subtitles
Masterfully combining Eastern and Western art styles, Sakuran is based on a popular Japanese manga about an orphan girl. Kiyoha is a free spirit who attempts to live life on her own terms as she rises through the ranks of a brothel in the pleasure district of Edo-period Japan. Rather than power or wealth, she seeks true love within the rigid societal structure. The directorial debut of renowned photographer Mika Ninagawa, this film melds historical drama with a music-video sensibility, and is characterised by fast pace, brash colours and dreamy, couture-driven art direction. Infusing feudal-era Edo with the hip style of contemporary Tokyo, the soundtrack makes use of pop music genres to hype up the ambiance. Hide description ↑ - Sunday 7 March 2pm (screening as advertised)
Wednesday 10 March 11am (note new date and time)
Sunday 14 March 11am (note new date and time)
Sharaku
Dir: Masahiro Shinoda (1995)
115 mins 35mm Colour Rated R (unclassified)
Hiroyuki Sanada, Frankie Sakai
Japanese with English subtitles
About the changed screenings: the previously advertised Wednesday 3 March screenings of Sharaku were not able to go ahead due to a problem with the film print. A new print has arrived and the Sunday 7 March screening will occur as advertised. There will be screenings in an earlier 11am timeslot on Wednesday 7 and Sunday 14 March. These are additional to the normal screenings on those days, detailed below.
Offering a stunning depiction of life in 18th-century Edo, this fictional biography of the famous Japanese woodblock artist Sharaku tantalises the viewer with lavish scenes from Kabuki theatre and the pleasure houses of the Yoshiwara district. Sharaku was the first ukiyo-e artist to depict subjects in a realistic manner. With little known about his later years, veteran director Masahiro Shinoda imagines the artist as a small-time Kabuki theatre performer who, crippled by an accident, is relegated to street performer and set painter. In many ways Sharaku is less a portrait of the artist than of a time and place; the voluptuous, teeming Edo of the 1790s. Hide description ↑ - Wednesday 10 March 2pm & 7.15pm
Sunday 14 March 2pm
Zatôichi
Dir: Takeshi Kitano (2003)
116 mins 35mm Colour Rated MA15+
Takeshi Kitano, Tadanobu Asano
Japanese with English subtitles
Created by novelist Kan Shimozawa, Zatôichi is a super-human swordsman who has featured in a total of 26 films produced in Japan since 1962. Set in the Edo period, blind Zatôichi makes his living by gambling and giving massages. But behind his humble facade, he is a master swordsman, gifted with lightning-fast draw and strokes of breathtaking precision. In this 2003 version, directed by Takeshi Kitano, Zatôichi is destined for a violent showdown when he stumbles on two beautiful geisha avenging their parents' murder in a town run by sinister gangs. Hide description ↑ - Wednesday 17 March 2pm & 7.15pm
Sunday 21 March 2pm
The life of Oharu (Saikaku Ichidai Onna)
Dir: Kenji Mizoguchi (1952)
147 mins 35mm B&W Rated R (unclassified)
Kinuyo Tanaka, Tsuki Matsura
Japanese with English subtitles
Told in the form of a flashback, The life of Oharu is a tragic chronicle of the decline of a woman, from a lady-in-waiting in the imperial court of 17th-century Japan, through exile, concubinage and numerous stages of prostitution. The film is unsettlingly real because of Mizoguchi's simple style and ravishing pictorialism, but above all, due to the performance of Kinuyo Tanaka as Oharu – a victim to social convention, jealousy and bad luck. Well known for his sympathetic portrayal of women in a male-dominated society, Mizoguchi is one of cinema's greatest directors and a meticulous craftsman of period film. Screening presented in conjunction with the Japan Foundation, Sydney. Hide description ↑ - Wednesday 24 March 2pm & 7.15pm
Sunday 28 March 2pm
Empire of passion (Ai No Borei)
Dir: Nagisa Oshima (1978)
105 mins 35mm Colour Rated R (unclassified)
Tatsuya Fuji, Kazuko Yoshiyuki
Japanese with English subtitles
Combining eroticism and the supernatural, director Oshima offers a nightmarish tale of retribution. Set in a Japanese village at the end of the 19th century, the film charts the downfall of a married woman and her younger lover, following the murder of her husband. In feudal Japan, where arranged marriages of convenience were usual, young lovers were sometimes compelled between cruel crimes or committing double-love suicide. These stories became a popular topic for playwrights and ukiyo-e and a print by Utamaro (included in the exhibition) depicts a pair of young lovers (Okoma and Saizaburo) in a similar situation. Oshima's elegant yet unrelenting film earned him the best director award at the Cannes Film Festival. Hide description ↑ - Wednesday 31 March 2pm & 7.15pm
Sunday 4 April 2pm
Utamaro and his five women (Utamaro o Meguru Go-nin no Onna)
Dir: Kenji Mizoguchi (1946)
94 mins 35mm B&W Rated R (unclassified)
Minosuke Bando, Kotaro Bando
Japanese with English subtitles
Drawn to the tea-houses, bars and geishas amidst the frenzied existence of 18th-century Edo, the printmaker Utamaro painstakingly devotes himself to his work, expressing love for five women through his art. They are his models, including a courtesan, the great Kinuyo Tanaka. Utamaro and his five women is regarded as one of Mizoguchi's greatest achievements – a compelling depiction of the time revealing the changing values of the late Tokugawa era and anticipating the erosion of traditional social structure in Mizoguchi's own post-World War II Japan. One of the most stirring of cinema's classics about artistic creation, it is noteworthy as an examination of the place of women in 18th-century Japan. Hide description ↑ - Wednesday 7 April 2pm & 6pm (note earlier evening starting time)
Sunday 11 April 2pm
Kwaidan
Dir: Masaki Kobayashi (1964)
163 mins 35mm Colour Rated R (unclassified)
Michiyo Aratama, Misako Watanabe
Japanese with English subtitles
The term 'Kwaidan' became widespread during Japan’s Edo period due to the popularity of a parlour game called Hyakumonogatari Kaidankai or Gathering of one hundred supernatural tales. Probably first played amongst the samurai class as a test of courage, it later became fashionable amongst the townspeople. Participants in the game would attempt to recall 100 ghost stories from ancient folklore in the hope that a supernatural entity would appear. Drawing on this tradition, Kobayashi's Kwaidan is a compendium of four ghost stories. One of the most expensive films made in Japan until that time, it was shot entirely in a makeshift studio – a giant aeroplane hanger. Kobayashi used his training in Japanese painting and fine arts to create stylised, painterly set designs in luminescent colours which seem to hail from another world. Screening presented in conjunction with the Japan Foundation, Sydney. Hide description ↑ - Wednesday 14 April 2pm & 7.15pm
Sunday 18 April 2pm
Twilight samurai (Tasogare Seibei)
Dir: Yôji Yamada (2002)
129 mins 35mm Colour Rated M
Hiroyuki Sanada, Rie Miyazawa
Japanese with English subtitles
The first film in director Yamada's acclaimed samurai trilogy is a touching cinematic masterpiece which explores aspects of ancient Japanese culture: love, agony and the art of sword fighting. Based on three short stories from popular novelist Fujisawa Shuhei, Twilight samurai offers a realistic depiction of the life of Seibei, a low-ranking samurai and widower with two young daughters to support. One day he encounters Tomoe, a childhood acquaintance, and the two quickly rekindle their friendship. Fearing he is too poor to offer marriage to Tomoe, the humble Seibei accepts an order to kill a troublesome samurai in order to win back wealth and honour. Hide description ↑ |
| |  Still from Sakuran (dir Mika Ninagawa, 2006)
Anna Tsuchiya as Kiyoha
Courtesy: Asmik Ace Entertainment
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| | | | Prices | Admission Free
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