The Catch - Radical Japan: Cinema and State - Nine Films by Nagisa Oshima Part 1

Over the years I’ve only ever seen the occasional film by Nagisa Oshima, so Radiance’s announcement of their Radical Japan box set, containing nine of his films (including one I recently almost bought on an out-of-print DVD, for far too much money) was one I was glad to hear, because it would give me a chance to really dig into his filmography. Honestly, I never fully got on with his Cruel Story of Youth, and I got what he was trying to do with In The Realm of the Senses, but neither did much for me at the time, maybe why I’d not properly dug into his work. But with screeners in-hand this forced me to confront his fearsome filmography, starting with his first independent film from 1961, The Catch. 

Villagers capture a black-American solder (Hugh Hurd) and due to the edict of the government are forced to keep him locked up, awaiting the authorities to haul him away for interrogation. Yet he becomes a focus of disdain and anger for the pent-up frustrations of the villagers. 

Anyone expecting a film with the moral rectitude and social togetherness of, say, Akira Kurosawa’s The Most Beautiful (1944), don’t look to The Catch, which if anything is an excoriating image of wartime Japan. The villagers, lorded over by The Chief (Rentaro Mikuni), are mixture of anger, envy, greed and spite; duplicitous and abusive, these characters do not show a society pulling together. Quite the opposite, we’re immediately told by The Chief’s wife what a bastard he is, sleeping with his own daughter-in-law while her husband, The Chief’s son, is fighting in the war, and this told to The Chief’s niece, Mikiko (Eiko Oshima). It’s totally unsparing in its depiction throughout. Don’t watch The Catch looking for catharsis either; the villagers ebb and flow between accusations, revelations, venting anger and spiteful bile – especially towards The Chief – they learn nothing from what they face, the decisions they make and the tragedies that occur due to them.  

There’s little to redeem the villagers, happy to cry out at the suggestions of Tokyo burning in the distance - good riddance, let it burn, let the Tokyoites burn - all this heedless of those evacuees that are living amongst them. But then they are almost more despised than the American, who they talk of in the worst, most racist terms. Their racism stems, you suspect, not just from ignorance, fear and anger but from their insular nature. There is little in the way of empathy amongst them and when there is it is mainly focussed inwardly: the sudden message of a death of a son in the war causes a mother to wail but the village, beyond the minute’s silence and bland statements that he died a hero to the nation and the emperor, could not really care less.

If the film is Oshima turning his sights toward the Japanese people then The Chief is the key figure under the microscope: a manipulator, hypocrite, rapist (it’s only an evacuee, only a Tokyoite needing to be fed) and hated figure, yet the village are still willing to follow him. Perhaps because he has a decisive voice unlike the local Bureaucrat (Rokko Toura), who is meant to provide guidance to the village, but though a veteran of the war (and a one-legged one at that), he’s a blowhard, declares himself just a messenger; he flatters with platitudes that the villagers will get more food than they need by turning over the American, but you know it will never materialise because he’s so ineffectual and this will in turn fan the flames further such that you know the American’s end will not be a good one. 

True, though the film is as stark as it’s black and white photography, you do feel there is some hope: some of the village children, especially – if only eventually – with Hachiko (Isao Hirizumi), the brother of a deserter, Jiro (Toshiro Ishido) and Makiko. By the end they seem to have some sense of shame and horror at what is happening to their town. They are also not innocents. You notice when Makiko sleeps with a man, she is told she's not a virgin and she agrees with no embarrassment; if anything she is quietly liberated, though often dressed in a sailor suit suggesting a good schoolgirl. The American too evokes your sympathy, he's not quite an innocent and we don't get to see much of his inner life but his humanity is noticeable in those moments where the worst could otherwise rise to the surface, a counterpoint to the actions of the villagers.

Importantly Oshima tends not to overplay his hand when it comes to the grim messaging of his film, often allowing it to unfold in long takes, the camera slowly moving or stationary, allowing us to view the villagers in all their ‘glory’. The photography has a grainy starkness to it that suits the subject matter and often Oshima creates captivating images with his camera. Other moments are haunting, such as the slow zoom onto a coffin where we see children's hands throwing earth onto it. It’s a remarkable, disturbing image that Oshima holds before us and The Catch is honestly a remarkable, disturbing film. I’m sure there are plenty of cultural subtleties that I missed, as well as some of the relationships between the villagers, but that never matters for the resultant film is a powerful, potent one indeed, and one I suspect you may need to watch more than once to really feel the nuance; but that doesn’t stop the sting of the first watch being what it is, for The Catch is a searing story of racism and a refusal to acknowledge actions and deeds for what they really are, tearing away the veils of reality of war at home.