Representing Emotional Lives of Precarious Japan: Jun Ichikawa’s Tony Takitani
Keywords:
film language, Japanese films, Jun Ichikawa, emotions, precarityAbstract
The objective of this paper is to analyze how Japan’s postwar history, particularly the current time of precarity, is represented in the Japanese language film Tony Takitani. In addition to the conventional cinematic expression of narration and background music, Jun Ichikawa and his colleagues effectively used (1) shallow focus and off-screen environmental sounds to depict the characters’ isolation from society, and (2) a combination of editing, screen direction, and character movement to suggest how history is experienced differently by the multiple characters. By contrasting Tony, who is tormented by a sense of loss, with the optimistic Hisako, Ichikawa portrayed the pivotal moments in Japan’s postwar history not merely as tragic, but as multifaceted.
References
Amamiya, K. (2007), Purekariāto: Dejitaru hiyatoi sedai no fuan na ikikata [Precariat: ThePrecarious Life of Digital Day Labor Generation], Tokyo: Yōsensha.
Baudrillard, J. (1998), The Consumer Society: Myths and Structures, London: Sage.
Barnett, D. (2014), Brecht in Practice: Theatre, Theory and Performance, London:Bloomsbury.
Denzin, N. (1984), On Understanding Emotion, San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Giannetti, L. (2014), Understanding Movies, Boston: Pearson Education.
Giddens, A. (1991), Modernity and Self-identity: Self and Society in the Late Modern Age,California: Stanford University Press.
Gould, D. (2009), Moving Politics: Emotion and ACT UP’s Fight against AIDS, Chicago:University of Chicago Press.
Hochschild, A. (1983), The Managed Heart: Commercialization of Human Feeling, Berkeley,CA: University of California Press.
Holbrook, M. and Hirschman, E. (1982), “The Experiential Aspects of Consumption: Consumer Fantasies, Feelings, and Fun”, Journal of Consumer Research, 9(2): 132-140.
Kawade Shobō Shinsha (2009), Ichikawa Jun, Tokyo: Kawade Shobō Shinsha.
Lyttleton, C. (2004), “Fleeing the Fire: Transformation and Gendered Belonging in Thai HIV/AIDS Support Groups”, Medical Anthropology, 23(1): 1-40.
Marcus, G. (2000), “Emotions in Politics”, Annual Review of Political Science, 3(1): 221-250.
Mita, M. (1992), Social Psychology of Modern Japan, translated by S. Suloway, London: Kegan Paul International.
Mori, H. (2019), “‘Tony Takitani’ no honbunkaitei (6) shōto/rongu ryōbājon no tōjōjosei nikansuru byōsha (1) [Text Creative of Tony Takitani (Vol.6) Difference in Depiction of Short and Long Versions of Women (1)]”, Hyogengaku (5): 19-26.
Murakami, H. (1999), “Tony Takitani”, in Murakami, H. (ed.), Rekishinton no yūrei. [Lexington Ghosts], Tokyo: Bungei Shunju.
________. (2006), “Tony Takitani”, in Rubin, T. (trans.), Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman [E-reader version], New York: Vintage.
Neuman, W. et al. (2007)., The Affect Effect: Dynamics of Emotion in Political Thinking and Behavior, University of Chicago Press.
Ochiai, E. (1994), 21-seiki kazoku e [Toward the Twenty First Century Family], Tokyo: Yūhikaku.
Pawlett, W. (2007), Jean Baudrillard: Against Banality, London: Routledge.
Reddy, W. (2001), The Navigation of Feeling: Framework for a History of Emotions, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Tsing, A. (2015), The Mushroom at the End of the World: On the Possibility of Life in Capitalist Ruins, New Jersey: Princeton University Press.
Yoshimi, S. (2009), Posuto sengo shakai: sirizu nihon kingendaishi 9 [The Postwar Society: Japanese Modern History Series Volume 9], Tokyo: Iwanami.
Williams, R. (1977), Marxism and Literature, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
________. (2013), The Long Revolution, London: Chatto & Windus.
Bowman, D. (2007), Tony Takitani, Midnight Eye, retrieved 27 July 2020 from http://www.midnighteye.com/reviews/tony-takitani/
Dargis, M. (2005), He’s an Isolated Fellow; She’s Addicted to Shopping, retrieved 27 July 2020 from http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/29/movies/hes-an-isolated-fellow-shes-addicted-to-shopping.html
Ichikawa Jun Office (2009), Biography, retrieved 2 August 2020 from http://www.ichikawa-jun.com/bio.html
Ichikawa, J. (Director) (2005), Tony Takitani [DVD], Japan: Geneon Entertainment.
Muramatsu, M. (Director) (2005), Hareta ie [Sunny Home] [DVD], Japan: Geneon Entertainment.
Ozu, Y. (Director) (1953/2013), Tokyo Monogatari [Tokyo Story] [DVD], Japan: Shochiku.
Sakamoto, R. (2007), Tony Takitani Original Soundtracks [CD], Japan: Commons.
