★ 7 / 10
When a pair of brothers, one young and
dave s
When a pair of brothers, one young and immature, the other considerably more worldly, fall for the same woman, who happens to be married, matters spiral out of…
When a pair of brothers, one young and immature, the other considerably more worldly, fall for the same woman, who happens to be married, matters spiral out of control, ultimately ending in tragedy. Ko Nakahira's Crazed Fruit, set in post-WW2 Japan, is the story of youth rejecting traditional Japanese values in favor of a more liberal lifestyle comprised of hedonistic pleasures. While not without its faults (the music score often feels like it would be more suited to a Hawai'ian luau and some scenes run much longer than necessary), Crazed Fruit often feels like a highly-stylized take on Rebel Without a Cause, released a year earlier, filled with frustrated youth seeking out some way of expressing their distaste of the establishment.
★ 7 / 10
For the first half of the movie I
william d
For the first half of the movie I thought, "Apparently 1950s American cinema did not corner the market on movies about spoiled young hipsters, the Japanese did…
For the first half of the movie I thought, "Apparently 1950s American cinema did not corner the market on movies about spoiled young hipsters, the Japanese did it too." Then the movie took a nice dark turn as two brothers compete for the same woman.
★ 8 / 10
What a fascinating film this is. Elements of
R T
What a fascinating film this is. Elements of it surprised me for 1956, and in particular for a Japanese movie. It seems to me a forerunner of the French New…
What a fascinating film this is. Elements of it surprised me for 1956, and in particular for a Japanese movie. It seems to me a forerunner of the French New Wave, and that this archetypal 'Sun Tribe' effort represents an even bigger departure from traditional Japanese cinema at the time than those films would be to the French. No wonder François Truffaut was such a fan of it.
The story is straightforward - two brothers fall for the same woman - but this is a film about tone, and context. Everything about it screams post-war, disaffected youth. A group of young men are bored, critical of traditional ways, and looking for good times - and young ladies. The younger of the two brothers (Masahiko Tsugawa) has an innocence about him, and falls for a pretty woman (Mie Kitahara) without realizing she's already married. The drama deepens when his older brother (Yujiro Ishihara) begins putting the moves on her behind his back.
The openness with which Kitahara's sexuality is displayed is a little shocking, though there is a grace to it, and it's refreshing to see. She deceives her American husband, and enjoys being the center of attention at a party. With the younger brother she needs to provide encouragement for him to make love to her, in one scene moving his hands up on to her breast. With the older brother, she gives way to his forceful overtures, even after saying 'no' initially. If that sort of thing is a trigger to you, you may want to avoid this one, as it also has the young men competing early on to see who can bring the hottest girl to a party, and other testosterone-fueled chatter. In general, the characters are hard to like, which may also be a turn-off. On the other hand, that's part of the point, and the film shows a reckless and sexually carefree youth in ways that are less inhibited than Hollywood at the time.
All of the principal actors turn in solid performances, and Masumi Okada is quite debonair in a supporting role. Mie Kitahara is quite pretty, and it's interesting that she would marry Ishihara, the actor who plays the older brother, just four years later. There is a little unevenness in the shots director Kô Nakahira captures - some are just beautiful, while others seem low-budget - but it's an impressive first film, and all the more so as it was a few years ahead of the French New Wave (e.g. Chabrol's Le Beau Serge (1958), Truffaut's 400 Blows (1959), Godard's Breathless (1960), etc). It seems to me the film ought to be better known.
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