Tazuko Sakane


Tazuko Sakane was a Japanese film director. She was Japan's first female director, followed by Kinuyo Tanaka. Her first feature film New Clothing is known to be a first Japanese feature film directed by a female. Majority of her films are educational nonfiction films produced by Manchukuo Film Association for Japanese immigrants and Manchu in Manchukuo. Her only known surviving film is known to be Brides on the Frontier. She worked closely with a Japanese Director Kenji Mizoguchi and credited as an Editor and/or Assistant Director for over 15 films directed by him. While growing up, her father, a wealthy businessman, often took her to the cinema. She graduated from Nikkatsu Uzumaki girls school in 1929.

Personal Life

Born on December 7, 1904 as the eldest daughter of six siblings between her father, Seiichi Sakane and her mother, Shige, who were origin in Kamigyo-ku, Kyoto. The mother was born in an old family “Sakuma” in Tango, but because there was no successor, Tazuko was registered as the patriarch of the Sakuma family at the age of two and became Tazuko Sakumada. However, Tazuko continued to use her paternal last name “Sakane” throughout her life.
Of the six children of the couple, only the eldest son Akira and the eldest daughter Tazuko lived long. The family was wealthy because her father made an invention, and Tazuko progressed from Imadegawa Kindergarten to Neutral Sale Elementary School and Kyoto Prefectural Kyoto First High School. The school, called “Fuichi”, was a prestigious school in Kyoto. After graduation, she went to Doshisha Women's College English Department according to her desire of continuing studying.
In 1923, Tazuko dropped out of school for reason of “convenient to do housework”, and in March of the following year, her mother died suddenly at the age of 47. Soon after, a woman named Daisetsu Tsuru became the second wife. In line with the marriage recommended by her died mother, Tazuko met with an obstetrician and gynecologist named Takaoka and married in 1925 at the age of 21. However, this marriage did not go well. Tazuko left the house and returned to her parents’ home. The eyes around all looked coldly at Tazuko, so she decided to be self-reliance. Aspiring to the film industry, she was introduced by her father in 1929 as a director assistant at Nikkatsu Dazai Photo Studio. Therefore, replacing her predecessor Mitsue Goda, Tazuko worked for the director Kenji Mizoguchi, and obtained the friendship of Mrs. Kenji and Chieko . Since then, Tazuko had been involved in making movies as a member of Mizoguchi group, and had learned practical matters.
When Mizoguchi left Nikkatsu in 1932 and moved to the Shinko Kinema, Tazuko was also invited to move to the company. Mizoguchi then made “Taki no Shiraito”, “Gion Festival”, and “Kanfuren”, and Tazuko helped him as a director assistant. In 1933, Irie Pro, who co-produced “Taki no Shiraito”, asked Tazuko to try to supervise, but in the end it did not happen. In 1934, Mizoguchi moved to Tokyo with Tazuko and joined Nikkatsu Tamagawa Photo Studio . Around this time, Tazuko asked again for the promotion of the director, but the reaction of the staff was so cold that it was not realized. It said that Tazuko was planning to make a movie for Uncle Ashiaga. Tazuko disappointedly returned to Kyoto with the invitation by Mizoguchi, and joined the first movie he just made. Tazuko started living near her father in Kyoto, and served as assistant director under the Mizoguchi for “Otsukuru Osen”, “Maria no Yuki”, and “Koujaku Grass”.
32-year-old Tazuko asked for the promotion of the director again. This was finally realized, and she decided to make Kosugi Tenga's original “First appearance” into a movie. “First appearance” was written by Haruo Takayanagi and Tazuko brought that out. Mizoguchi also put his name to this work as a director guidance. The casts were Ichiro Tsukita and Chiyoko Okura. The movie was completed and was released on March 5, 1936. In this way, Tazuko Sakane became the first Japanese female film director. Although “First appearance” was not successful industrially and did not get a good reputation from critics, Tazuko did not give up and continued to make movies with Mizoguchi.
In those days when the movie industry was prosperous and human resources were flowing, Mizoguchi left the first movie, whose management situation deteriorated, and moved to the Shinko Kinema, Kamo Matsu Takeshita studio. Tazuko followed him, and produced the “Rokugiku Monogatari” and “Nanwa Onna”. Mina Miguchi casted Kinyo Tanaka for the first time in “Nanwa Onna”. Since then, they produced excellent works in combination. Kinyo later became the second female film director in Japan. Around this time, Tazuko began to feel the distance to Mizoguchi, she wanted to do the directing again, and received Mizoguchi's recommendation and joined Riken Kagaku Film Co., Ltd. She went to Hokkaido and filmed the documentary “North Brotherhood” on the theme of Ainu life.
Around this time, Mizoguchi's wife Chieko, who had a close relationship with Tazuko, had a mental disorder and was admitted to Kyoto Prefectural Hospital. On the day of Chieko's hospitalization, Mizoguchi went to the studio and continued to work, and the staff who were right there were shocked. Mizoguchi proposed to Tazuko during the time of Chieko's hospitalization, but of course it was not acceptable. In 1942, Tazuko joined the Keimin Movie Club of Manchu Film Association in Manchuria as an immediate action.
After arriving in Shinkyo and making a work called “Hardworking Women”, Tazuko continued to make “Healthy Small National”, “Bride of Pioneer”, “Vegetable Storage”, “How to Burn the Heating Room”, etc. While Japan was heavily defeated, Tazuko finished “Indoor Horticulture”, “Spring Gardening”, “First Aid”, “Basic Emergency Aid” and so on. However, on August 15, 1945, Japan surrendered unconditionally, and on August 20, the Soviet army arrived in Shinkyo. The Manchu Film Association was confiscated by the Soviet army, with no plans to return to Japan. Part of the staff was hired by Tohoku Denki Co., Ltd. by the Eight Route Army who was stationed in exchange for the Soviet Army, and Tazuko also got a job there. She was allowed to return to Japan in August 1946, and on October 21 of the same year, she and other 50 Japanese stepped through Japan from Shinkyo to Jinzhou.
Returning to her parents’ home in Kyoto, Tazuko visited Mizoguchi at Shimokamo Photo Studio. Mizoguchi did not know who she was for a moment. Although surprised by her transformation, Mizoguchi brought Tazuko to Shochiku again. However, Tazuko was unable to join as director assistant due to the struggle of power in Shochiku, and was hired as a recording staff in the editorial department. Even for Mizoguchi, who had a deep relationship with actress Kinyo Tanaka, while Chieko's younger brother's wife was a de facto wife, Tazuko was already a past existence and more than just a clerk.
Mizoguchi, who had not been blessed with hits for a long time, revived with the hit of “Women of the Night”. And in 1952, “Nishitsuru Ichijo”, filmed with Kinyo, won the director's award at the Venice International Film Festival, and immediately pushed Mizoguchi into a master of the world. Kinyo entered the supervisory business and directed “Koibun” for the first time. It has been 17 years since the “First Appearance” taken by Tazuko. Mizoguchi continued to receive high acclaim for “Ametsuki Monogatari” and “Yamao Daigo”, and “Yang Guifei”, “New·Heike Monogatari”. He died of myeloid leukemia on August 24, 1956.
After leaving Shochiku Kyoto Studio in 1962 at the retirement age, Tazuko continued to be involved in movies in the form of part-time jobs until 1970, and died of gastric cancer on September 2, 1975, at the age of 71. She appeared as a collaborator in the documentary film “Record of the life of a movie director Kenji Mizoguchi” released about four months before her death.

Legacy

Before the 1980s, the hierarchical corporate structure of the major studios was a major barrier to women entering the industry in a creative capacity, with the scant handful of those who did direct hailing from an acting background, barring the freak exception of Japan's first woman director, Sakane Tazuko who made one feature, 1936's "Hatsu Sugata". Unfortunately, no prints of the film exist.
The first Japanese women to make films came from the circles around well-known male director Kenji Mizoguchi whose many films tended to centre on heroines. Mizoguchi and his films about suffering women connect with current discussions about “women’s directors” and women directors. When dealing with this most patriarchal of national cinemas and its “feminine” qualities, questions of sexual politics arise. Take Mizoguchi's unmentioned relationship with Tazuko. Under his patronage, Sakane became Japan's first and only female film director in the prewar period. Denied work after the war, she was forced, at age forty-two, to return to Mizoguchi as his script girl.
Her surviving production memos, scripts, and correspondence were donated to the Museum of Kyoto in 2004 in commemoration of the centennial of her birth. In the Sakane collection's file for The Downfall of Osen, roughly half of her records and Mizoguchi's one-page scribble of the sequence order survive.
Situated as a minority in the film industry, Sakane was nevertheless a privileged majority member of wartime society, as a Japanese national, and as a person who had some control over the mass media.

Style and Influence

A large part of Sakane's experience with filmmaking came from assisting and editing films under the tutelage of Kenji Mizoguchi. As a woman, she was very rarely taken seriously and often belittled by the men who dominated the industry. Her first attempt at becoming a director was overshadowed by rumors established by colleagues who had assumed the only way she could have made this promotion possible was through "having an affair with Mizoguchi" and so "Sakane's petition for promotion was eventually rejected." Similar to this experience, Sakane fell under scrutiny following her first film as a director, New Clothing, in which her personal life, including intimate topics such as her virginity, was publicly criticized and shamed in an article merely in the studio's effort to gain attention.
By adhering to colonial standards was Sakane's only choice in order to regain her position as a director in Japan. In doing so, she left Mizoguchi and began a project, Fellow Citizens in North, under the Tokyo Riken Film Company. Despite being enlisted as a director in an effort to create a propagandic film that documented Japan and assertion that the country was "one nation, one people," Sakane's personal intentions interfered. Due to wanting to maintain her personal style in spite of the colonialist assignment, Sakane created a film that documented the loss of history and native culture within Japan. However, she was made to fix and reshoot in order to create a film that met colonialist standards. Sakane never allowed political affiliations or war to affect how she filmed or role within these topics as a filmmaker. She merely used these situations as a means of establishing herself as a filmmaker.
It wasn't until Japan fell into war that Sakane found herself developing a sense of personal filming style that was not under the control of the studios she worked under. Due to the patriarchal restrictions of Japan that were tightening up due to the war, Sakane transferred over to the Manchuria Film Association in 1942. It was there that a majority of Sakane's films were focused on providing educational material for female audiences that didn't exist prior to her directorial debut. Despite having arrived in the association as an editor it was under the belief that only women can direct for women that she returned to that role. Sakane having stated in an interview that "given the necessity to make films for women in the Co-Prosperity Sphere, and that only women can make films for themselves, I was promoted again to director." It was here that her style became evident in reestablishing what exactly domestic relationships looked like and how women existed alongside men in Japanese and Chinese society.

Filmography

Director

Sakane directed a total of one Feature film and 14 nonfiction films, including:
YearOriginal TitleEnglish TitleNotes
1936初姿
Hatsu Sugata		New ClothingJapan's first feature film directed by a female. The film was about the naïve, premature emotions between a young geisha-to-be and a youth destined for Buddhist priesthood; it concluded with their separation. It was not a box office success, and Sakane never had a chance to direct a feature film again.
1942こども満州
Kodomo Manshū		Monthly Children in Manchuria, Episodes 19, 20, and 21Sakane moved to Manchukuo to join the Manchukuo Film Association in 1942, where majority of her non-fiction films were produced. There were three departments in the Association that each produced entertainment films, educational films, and news. She Joined the educational film department.
1942こども満州
Kodomo Manshū		Monthly Children in Manchuria
1942労働的女性
ōdōteki josei		Working Women
1942健康的小国民
Kenkōteki shōkokumin		Healthy Little National Subjects
1943開拓の花嫁
Kaitaku no Hanayome		Brides on the FrontierProduced by the Manchukuo Film Association. A propaganda film to encourage Japanese young woman to move to Manchuria to become the wives of Japanese emigrants, so-called brides of the Continent. Villagers played roles different from their actual lives; single women from "school of training future brides" were recruited to act in the film. It is her only film to be extant.
1943野菜の貯蔵
Yasai no chozō		Essential Life Knowledge series, The Preservation of Vegetables.Essential life knowledge series provided essential knowledge of everyday targeted particularly for woman in Manchukuo. It was created in both Japanese and Manchurian versions.
1943暖房の焚き方Danbō no tatakikataEssential Life Knowledge series, How to Set the Heater
1944室内園芸
Shitunai engei		Essential Life Knowledge series, Indoor Gardening
1944春天的園芸
Shunten teki engei		Essential Life Knowledge series, Gardening in Spring
1944救急法ノ基本
Kyukyuhō no kihō		Basics of Emergency CareMilitary Edition, Commissioned by the Kwantung Army
1944救急基本法Kyukyu kihonhōBasics of Emergency CarePopular Edition

Assistant Director/Second Unit Director

Sakane worked as assistant director for the following films:
YearOriginal TitleEnglish TitleDirectorCredits
1930唐人お吉 Tojin OkichiMistress of a ForeignerKenji MizoguchiAssistant Director
1931しかも彼等は行く Shikamo Karera wa YukuAnd Yet They Go OnKenji MizoguchiAssistant Director
1932時の氏神 Toki no UjigamiThe Man of the Moment/Timely MediatorKenji MizoguchiAssistant Director
1933祇園祭 Gion MatsuriGion FestivalKenji MizoguchiAssistant Director
1934神風連 Jinpu-ren The Jinpu GroupKenji MizoguchiAssistant Director
1934愛憎峠 Aizō TōgeThe Mountain Pass of Love and HateKenji MizoguchiAssistant Director
1935折鶴お千 Orizuru OsenThe Downfall of OsenKenji MizoguchiFirst Assistant Director
1935マリアのお雪 Maria no OyukiOyuki the VirginKenji MizoguchiAssistant Director
1935虞美人草 Gubijin-soThe PoppyKenji MizoguchiAssistant Director
1938露営の歌 Roei no UtaSong of the CampKenji MizoguchiAssistant Director
1938あゝ故郷 Aa kokyoAh, My Home TownKenji MizoguchiAssistant Director
1939残菊物語 Zangiku monogatariThe Story of the Last ChrysanthemumsKenji MizoguchiAssistant Director

Editor

Sakane worked as an editor on the following films:
YearOriginal TitleEnglish TitleDirectorCredits
1933滝の白糸 Taki no ShiraitoThe Water MagicianKenji MizoguchiEditor
1935虞美人草 Gubijin-soThe PoppyKenji MizoguchiEditor
1936浪華悲歌 Naniwa erejiiOsaka ElegyKenji MizoguchiEditor
1936祇園の姉妹 Gion no shimaiSisters of the GionKenji MizoguchiEditor
1937愛怨峡 Aien kyōThe Straits of Love and HateKenji MizoguchiEditor
1948夜の女たち Yoru no onnatachiWomen of the NightKenji MizoguchiEditor