Unlike many Japanese directors, who boasted well over 50 films under their belt, Kobayashi Masaki's 30 year career as a director produced a modest 21 fiction films. Of course quality out-weights quantity, and many of Kobayashi's films are among best Japanese films ever made. Yet, because there are "so few", you feel extra sad for the ones, that don't really live up to his standards. Kobayashi first made a personal film in 1953 with "Kabe atsuki heya" (The Thick-Walled Room), but the studio did not like and shelved it for three years. This made the director return to the Kinoshita flavor of his first two films, with some Shimizu-esque touches added here and there.
"Mittsu no ai" (Three Loves, 1953) is the weakest film in Kobayashi's filmography. His early efforts may be a little dull and lack his later societal angst, but they are not badly made films. He was a pro. But "Mittsu no ai" fails flat in everything it tries. The general idea is to depict a small rural community in the post-war years, and through the local characters, paint a portrait of three different kinds of love. This already is an arguable failing, since I counted five different kinds of love: love between mother and a child, love between man and woman, love between friends, love of God, and love of animals. Love of art could be the sixth, and I'm sure you could find more.
The film does not have one narrative, but instead introduces various characters and tells their stories. If there is one central character, that would be Heita, a mentally challenged boy, who loves running in the hills, and has an obsession about birds. The element of the film that gets most time is Heita's running, his birds, his friendship with another boy Ikujiro, and his weird relationship with a Christian priest (Ito Yunosuke). The priest struggles with his love of God, and also the love for his ex-wife. Yunosuke misses his mother, from whom he gets separated in the very beginning. There is also a poor painter, who is in love with the beautiful teacher, played by Kishi Keiko, and some other characters too, like the mother played by Yamada Isuzu.
The narrative threads do not really form a neat tapestry here, and they aren't that interesting either. To make his film comprehensible in at least some way, Kobayashi has added narration to the beginning and to the end. This frames the film as a Christian tale of moral, though the depiction of Christianity in this film is loose and thoroughly weird. Especially the religious portrayal of Heita's insanity is not well thought out.
I love Kobayashi's films, and I am also very fond of Shimizu Hiroshi's childhood depictions and Kinoshita Keisuke's young romances, both of which this film emulates. But "Three Loves" is chaotic from start to finish. The film lacks meaning or substance, and though it tries to depict different kinds of love, it does not have anything new to say about them. Two hours becomes a long time to spend running on the hills with Christians chasing birds.
"Mittsu no ai" (Three Loves, 1953) is the weakest film in Kobayashi's filmography. His early efforts may be a little dull and lack his later societal angst, but they are not badly made films. He was a pro. But "Mittsu no ai" fails flat in everything it tries. The general idea is to depict a small rural community in the post-war years, and through the local characters, paint a portrait of three different kinds of love. This already is an arguable failing, since I counted five different kinds of love: love between mother and a child, love between man and woman, love between friends, love of God, and love of animals. Love of art could be the sixth, and I'm sure you could find more.
The film does not have one narrative, but instead introduces various characters and tells their stories. If there is one central character, that would be Heita, a mentally challenged boy, who loves running in the hills, and has an obsession about birds. The element of the film that gets most time is Heita's running, his birds, his friendship with another boy Ikujiro, and his weird relationship with a Christian priest (Ito Yunosuke). The priest struggles with his love of God, and also the love for his ex-wife. Yunosuke misses his mother, from whom he gets separated in the very beginning. There is also a poor painter, who is in love with the beautiful teacher, played by Kishi Keiko, and some other characters too, like the mother played by Yamada Isuzu.
The narrative threads do not really form a neat tapestry here, and they aren't that interesting either. To make his film comprehensible in at least some way, Kobayashi has added narration to the beginning and to the end. This frames the film as a Christian tale of moral, though the depiction of Christianity in this film is loose and thoroughly weird. Especially the religious portrayal of Heita's insanity is not well thought out.
I love Kobayashi's films, and I am also very fond of Shimizu Hiroshi's childhood depictions and Kinoshita Keisuke's young romances, both of which this film emulates. But "Three Loves" is chaotic from start to finish. The film lacks meaning or substance, and though it tries to depict different kinds of love, it does not have anything new to say about them. Two hours becomes a long time to spend running on the hills with Christians chasing birds.