**3. Quasi-Documentary**

In his fiction films, Shindo pursued a semi-documentary style that enabled him to depict the ¯ everyday with heightened realism. Examining how Shindo approached the representation of intense ¯ and controversial historic events reveals ye<sup>t</sup> another layer of his engagemen<sup>t</sup> with documentary film. (In)famously, a number of his works, such as *Children of Hiroshima* (Genbaku no ko, 1952) and *Sakuratai 8.6* (Sakuratai chiru, 1988), relate to the atomic bombings of his hometown, Hiroshima. Another film, *Lucky Dragon No. 5* (Daigo fukuryumaru, 1959), is about the crew of the eponymous fishing vessel that ¯ was exposed to atomic fallout from nuclear testing. In these films, Shindo alternates documentary footage with reenacted sequences, which makes them semi-documentaries in the most literal sense, as well as enabling their retrospective labelling as docudrama or docufiction.

The passage from *Children of Hiroshima* (1952) that recreates the atomic explosion and its immediate aftermath with a Soviet montage influence, highly stylized shots of blood-mired and disfigured bodies, is certainly the most renowned and discussed one of Shindo's many versions of the disastrous event. ¯ A frame story about a teacher (Otowa) who visits the city in order to find her students and their families leads to a flashback when she is standing next to the A-Bomb Dome. Accompanied by the premonitory ticking of clocks, the city symphony-like calm and relaxed images of the everyday life of Hiroshima and its citizens suddenly transforms into a series of scenes which, in their pace and visceral horror, are reminiscent of the Odessa Steps sequence from *Battleship Potemkin* (Bronenosets Potyomkin, 1925, Sergei Eisenstein) (See Figure 5). The closeup of the hand of a clock that hits 8.15 acts as a trigger for the transition from one mode to the other.

**Figure 5.** *Children of Hiroshima* (Shindo Kaneto, 1952). ¯

Shindo revisited the events of these August days decades later in ¯ *Sakuratai 8.6*, which focuses on the eponymous travelling theatre troupe unlucky to have been performing in Hiroshima on that fateful day. In this part-documentary film, a series of interviews with the victims' colleagues and friends (most of them notable Japanese actors) are effortlessly alternated and juxtaposed with reenacted footage of the attack and its consequences, including the painful deaths of the two prominent members of Sakuratai, Maruyama Sadao (1901–1945) and Sonoi Keiko (1913–1945), on 16 and 21 August 1945, respectively. Besides documentary footage of various radiation victims, there is also a scene from *The*

*Rickshaw Man* (Muhomatsu no issh ¯ o, 1943, Inagaki Hiroshi) in which Sonoi had starred. In contrast to ¯ the interviews shot in color, the reenacted scenes are presented in a markedly grainy black and white cinematography, having the appearance of Japanese films from a few decades earlier.

The scene in *Sakuratai 8.6* where several people who have survived the explosion are making an effort to crawl clear from the rubble and help each other is presented in a much more realist style than the montage sequence in *Children of Hiroshima*, which has sometimes been criticized for its emotional detachment. Curiously, parts of the sequence, such as children playing in water, a baby crawling over the floor and a withering sunflower, are borrowed from the earlier film, in effect recycling one reenactment alongside the new one. Something similar happens in *A Postcard*, where the final stages of the war are represented by a brief passage with the same clock, treated as if already a form of documentary footage (See Figure 6). This is the point where semi-documentary at the same time becomes quasi-documentary that mixes ready-made 'documentary' footage with Shindo's new ¯ 'semi-documentary' passages. Ostensibly, this is also done out of convenience because the director can use whatever is readily available in his personal archive.

**Figure 6.** *Children of Hiroshima* (Shindo Kaneto, 1952); ¯ *A Postcard* (Shindo Kaneto, 2011). ¯

Another example from *Sakuratai 8.6* that is even more telling of Shindo's self-conscious play ¯ with the cinematic medium shows a search party, two men in uniforms, entering a large building, one of the few still erect after the catastrophe. As they walk in, the camera pans to reveal film lighting equipment as well as a huge canvas with a life-size photo of the destroyed cityscape of Hiroshima standing against the wall (See Figure 7). The ensuing action then takes place in a stage play fashion, employing the photo as backcloth. By underlining artificiality and providing ye<sup>t</sup> another mode of representation enmeshed with theatre that makes the film medium itself literally visible, Shindo points ¯ at the inevitability of staging in cinema and the impossibility of non-fiction.

**Figure 7.** *Sakuratai 8.6* (Shindo Kaneto, 1988). ¯

Whereas human figures on the verge of disintegration surely allow for some striking cinematic images, the depiction of the consequences of the atomic bomb has never been the only device for Shindo when commenting on the main trauma of his generation, the Pacific War. There is also a much ¯ more intimate and subdued image that he has relied on (and recycled) in a number of films. In *The Story of a Beloved Wife* (1951), while the Shindo-like protagonist (Uno J ¯ ukichi) is trying to finish his ¯ final draft of a script, people have gathered outside on the street to wave flags and sing songs to bid farewell to a young man from the neighborhood who has received his conscription orders. 'Banzai' is shouted but the general mood is somber. A few scenes later, heavy rain is falling on the same street while there is a silent funeral parade for the young soldier who has returned home in a small white wooden box carried by his mother.

A somewhat more light-hearted and humorous as well as explicitly political use of the same motif can be found in *The Strange Story of Oyuki* (Bokuto kidan, 1992). This time, the singing and hoorays are ¯ conducted by the prostitutes living in the Tamanoi red-light district, contrasted with documentary footage of the prime minister Toj ¯ o Hideki on a military parade greeting schoolboys who have joined ¯ the army (See Figure 8). Shindo revisited this motif once more in ¯ *A Postcard*, again in an ironic vein, with a hint of black humor. The elder son of a peasant family receives his orders and is given a farewell ceremony in front of the family house. In the next scene, the same people walk into the same frame, this time in silence and carrying a small wooden box containing the soldier's bones. Not before long, the younger brother is also drafted, and all the rituals are repeated in an identical manner, frame by frame. Shindo is repeating a common trope of wartime cinema with a critical distance by establishing ¯ a stark contrast between the clamorous farewell paid to the soldier and the silent homecoming of his remains.

**Figure 8.** *The Strange Story of Oyuki* (Shindo Kaneto, 1992). ¯

*A Postcard* takes as its premise Shindo's own real-life experience of spending the last days of the ¯ war in cleaning duty while the rest of his unit was killed in combat. However, this is not the only occasion when he has linked his own life with cinema and seminal events in modern Japanese history. Shindo's two-volume ¯ *History of Japanese Scenario* (*Nihon shinarioshi*, (Shindo 1989 ¯ )) is organized along time frames that seem to overlap conspicuously with that of his own life and involvement in the film industry. The book starts with the infamous Zigomar incident in 1912, the year Shindo was born ¯ and the blurb on the cover of the book ambiguously characterizes it as 'the first autobiography of/in Japanese film' (Nihon eiga no hajimete no jijoden). Among comparable attempts at the historiography of Japanese cinema, it bears close affinity to oshima Nagisa's documentary, ¯ *100 Years of Japanese Cinema* (1995), with its often criticized gesture to include most of the director's own films within the survey up to the point when they seem to be structuring the entire history. In the final section, I will examine how Shindo, in those works more readily classifiable as documentaries, often actively infiltrates and ¯ interrupts the very text by inscribing himself as the author of the film.

## **4. Meta-Documentary**

Arguably Shindo's most solid achievement as a documentary filmmaker is the feature he made ¯ about his one-time mentor, Mizoguchi Kenji (1898–1956). Shot over many years during various other projects, *Kenji Mizoguchi: The Life of a Film Director* (Aru kantoku no shogai: Mizoguchi Kenji no kiroku, ¯ 1975) was very well received upon its release and placed first in the annual *Kinema junpo¯*'s critics' poll—the first such distinction for Shindo (he won again with ¯ *A Postcard* in 2011). Notably, the word *kiroku* is used in the film's original title as if to sugges<sup>t</sup> that, this time, Shindo has finally managed ¯ to simply 'record' without relying on reenactments. Compared to the films previously discussed, the approach is indeed more straight-forward and mostly operates within the genre conventions of documentary film.

It is evident from *Kenji Mizoguchi: The Life of a Film Director* that Shindo reveres Mizoguchi ¯ but, at the same time, seems all too eager to expose the man behind the camera with all his human flaws. The film is structured around a string of interviews conducted with an impressive lineup of Mizoguchi's collaborators, often shot with the interviewer's shoulder visible, making Shindo's ¯ authorial presence ubiquitous (Figure 9). As an interviewer, Shindo emerges as a relentless interrogator, ¯ persistently forcing his witnesses to give away ground. For instance, he is teasing out testimonies from the actresses who had problematic relationships with Mizoguchi, such as Irie Takako (1911–1995) and, notably, Tanaka Kinuyo (1909–1977). Towards the end of the film, Shindo keeps pushing Tanaka ¯ towards a confession she probably would not even be able to make about the exact nature of her relationship with Mizoguchi. Shindo used material from this interview for writing ¯ *Tanaka Kinuyo: The Novel* (Shosetsu Tanaka Kinuyo, 1983), subsequently made it into the film ¯ *An Actress* (Joyu, 1987) ¯ by Ichikawa Kon, where scenes from various films are reenacted with Yoshinaga Sayuri as Tanaka.

**Figure 9.** *Kenji Mizoguchi: The Life of a Film Director* (Shindo Kaneto, 1975). ¯

Shindo appears again as an interviewer in ¯ *A Paean* (Sanka, 1972), shot around the same time as *Kenji Mizoguchi: The Life of a Film Director*. However, this film is an adaptation of Tanizaki Jun'ichiro's ¯ short story, *A Portrait of Shunkin* (Shunkinsho, 1933), and the director is made part of the multilayered ¯ fictional world of the original plot that comprises various conflicting sources telling the same story of the blind *koto* teacher, Shunkin, and her faithful servant, Sasuke. In a sequence where the author (Shindo) is interviewing Shunkin's maid Teru (Otowa), the shot/reverse shot technique suddenly ¯ reveals blood gushing from the edge of his mouth (See Figure 10). By way of a wry commentary on his own work as a filmmaker, Shindo seems to be alluding to the complexities of this role that never ¯ comes without strong authorial investment or violence inflicted upon its subject.

**Figure 10.** *A Paean* (Shindo Kaneto, 1972). ¯

Elsewhere (Kitsnik 2018), I have argued that Shindo's voice and physical features that appear to ¯ belong to a rural laborer become the site of authenticity that supports the perception of his films as semi-documentaries. In the examples above, by bringing the documentarist to the screen, not unlike fellow filmmakers Werner Herzog, Nick Broomfield or Michael Moore, Shindo also takes a step from ¯ self-reference to self-reflexion and, by so doing, moves towards what could be called meta-documentary. In Japan, Shindo was not alone in positioning himself as an unreliable author: suffice to think of ¯ Imamura Shohei's screen role in his ¯ *A Man Vanishes* (Ningen johatsu, 1967). Paradoxically, it seems ¯

that the more Shindo approaches documentary film proper, the more the focus shifts to the author and ¯ the agency of filmmaking.

Although very much invested in trying out various documentary styles, Shindo displays ¯ a (self-)critical stance towards the act of recording. In fact, one of Shindo's thematic preoccupations ¯ is the role he assigns to media reporting, both as part of film's context and narrative device. A characteristic example of this can be found in *Live Today, Die Tomorrow!* (Hadaka no juky ¯ usai, ¯ 1970), a film based on the life and crimes of the spree killer (and later novelist) Nagayama Norio, named Yamada Michio in the film. After newspaper headlines report Yamada's capture, his mother, Take (Otowa), led by a police officer, is shown getting off a train. The platform is swarmed with news reporters and photographers who all try to ge<sup>t</sup> a hold of her for any comment about her son's past. In order to do so, they run in flocks over the tracks, climb over fences and follow her down the stairs to the waiting lobby. All this is captured by a violently shaking hand-held camera that adds both intensity and a documentary feel to the sequence. The mother, looking very tired, is eventually cornered by the members of the press and pushed against a wall. A montage of closeups from different angles shows the mother closing her eyes and fainting, while the camera lights keep flashing over her pale face (See Figure 11). The homicidal acts committed by Yamada at once become thematized alongside the violent behavior of the press craving to report them.

**Figure 11.** *Live Today, Die Tomorrow!* (Shindo Kaneto, 1970). ¯

When making films on factual material such as *Live Today, Die Tomorrow!* or *Lucky Dragon No. 5*, Shindo includes the way these events were witnessed and reported at the time, turning media coverage ¯ into a crucial part of the film's narration. By so doing, Shindo reveals an affinity with the work ¯ of fellow filmmakers such as Matsumoto Toshio (1932–2017) and Oshima Nagisa (1932–2013) who, ¯ in addition to working with both fiction and documentary, often employed topical issues and their media representation in their films. In *Lucky Dragon No. 5*, it is through the gradual uncovering of the evidence by the press that we first find out about the consequences of what occurred to the ship crew exposed to nuclear fallout near Bikini Atoll in 1954 and, upon reading a newspaper, so does the crew (See Figure 12). After the ship's captain (Uno) is taken to a hospital in Tokyo for treatment, we receive information about the changes in his medical condition by scenes that cross-cut between his hospital room and reports on the radio. When his health suddenly deteriorates, the bed is surrounded by doctors while the reporters wait at the staircase; when the patient's wife arrives at the hospital, she is followed by a crowd of reporters. When the captain regains consciousness, this information is once again transmitted by the image of a reporter running up the stairs and telling his colleagues about it; later, when he finally succumbs to the radiation disease, radio is the first to make the announcement.

**Figure 12.** *Lucky Dragon No. 5* (Shindo Kaneto, 1959). ¯

By making the act of reporting such a visible presence on the screen, Shindo is in fact making ¯ an inquiry into media ethics. In the case of *Lucky Dragon No. 5*, it could be argued that the press was working within the confines of public interest. After all, it was the first to bring the devastating facts of nuclear fallout encountered by the fishing crew to the attention of the public. However, its treatment of the captain's struggle for his life, although clearly sympathetic to the victim and his family, contains clear hints of sensationalism. The latter tendency becomes much more evident in films such as *Live Today, Die Tomorrow!* and *The Strange Story of Oyuki*. In the latter, an adaptation of Nagai Kafu's (1879–1955) ¯ *A Strange Tale from the East of the River* (Bokuto Kidan, 1937), the timeline of this ¯ semi-autobiographical story is extended all the way to Kafu's (Tsugawa Masahiko) death. The famous ¯ last photograph taken by the yellow press, where the already deceased Kafu is discovered face down ¯ on the floor of his room, is reenacted in meticulous detail (See Figure 13). In contrast, *Kenji Mizoguchi: The Life of a Film Director* begins with Shindo entering the Kyoto hospital where Mizoguchi died, ¯ after which the picture of the walking director abruptly halts while the soundtrack goes on and provides a conversation with a hospital staff member who will not gran<sup>t</sup> the crew admission to the premises. By way of compromise, Shindo agrees to simply shoot a scene of the empty corridor. ¯

**Figure 13.** *The Strange Story of Oyuki* (Shindo Kaneto, 1992). ¯

## **5. Conclusions**

From early on in his long career, Shindo Kaneto displayed a strong interest in working ¯ with material based on real-life events and employing a variety of documentary film styles. This preoccupation can be traced from his first screenplay all the way to his final film, between which Shindo was invested in reproducing both the quiet drama of the everyday as well as controversial ¯ historical events. At the same time, Shindo expressed an awareness of the limitations of the cinematic ¯ medium, where the authorial position necessarily overrides any attempt of objective recording, rendering the notion of non-fiction all but meaningless. Equipped with this understanding, Shindo¯ often mixed fiction and documentary styles in his films, whether reenacting events in a highly stylized manner or recycling the resulting footage in his own subsequent work. It could be argued that this propensity to challenge and blur the boundaries between different modes of representation was one of the causes for the inconsistency of his directorial career that, in various ways, sought to answer the dilemma of how to create drama by recording social reality.

**Funding:** This research was funded by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS KAKENHI Grant Number JP17F17738).

**Conflicts of Interest:** The author declares no conflict of interest.
