TOKYO-GA (1985)
3 out of ****
With Chishu Ryu, Yuharu Atsuta, Werner Herzog;
Written & Directed by Wim Wenders;
Cinematography by Ed Lachman
TOKYO-GA has been called a film "diary," but it might be more apt to call it a scrapbook. It is an assortment of images, clips, reflections, and interviews assembled by Wim Wenders during a trip to Tokyo. The impetus for the trip, as described by Wenders himself, is to see whether the Tokyo--and by extension the Japan--captured so precisely in the films of Yasujiro Ozu still exists. Wenders holds Ozu in the highest esteem: he describes the revered Japanese director's oeuvre as the closest thing to a "sacred treasure" in the cinema.
The documentary was made in between two of Wenders's great works, PARIS, TEXAS and WINGS OF DESIRE. TOKYO-GA is a much more low-key, personal work, although it has the same sense of introspection and haphazardness that distinguishes the two fiction features. It represents, very deliberately, an attempt to wed Wenders's own style with that of Ozu; to emphasise the point, TOKYO-GA is framed by the beginning and ending of Ozu's most famous film, TOKYO STORY. Wenders remarks at one point that movies should be made the way we open our eyes: they should attempt simply to see what is real, rather than trying to prove a point. He believes that Ozu's films achieve this goal, and his documentary is an attempt to do the same.
The movie is in effect a rather shapeless series of digressions and anecdotes, connected tenuously by the twinned themes of Tokyo and Ozu. It is filtered through Wenders's own preoccupations with cinema and the ways it can both reveal and distort truth. He moves according to his whims from one sequence of images to another, punctuating them with his thoughts on the nature of representation, which tend to be less compelling than the representations themselves.
Although it is tedious on occasion--no one will ever accuse Wenders of using overly short takes--there are many pleasures to be had from his observations of Japan. An extended series of images of Japanese businessmen playing pachinko goes on for too long, but other moments are humorous, human, and fascinating. Members of the "Tokyo Rockabilly Club" perform Elvis impersonations in a park; a mother tries to cope with a petulant child in a subway station; ranks of people practice their golf stroke on a driving range atop a skyscraper; children play baseball on a cemetery path overhung with cherry blossom.
It is in this sampling of everyday peculiarities that Wenders seeks insight into contemporary Japan, circa 1985. There is no attempt to investigate broad social, political, and economic trends. And his method is effective: he succeeds in capturing, obliquely, something of the paradoxes which underlie Japanese society, the marriage of Western fashions to Eastern idiosyncracies. There are also interviews with former colleagues of Ozu: his cinematographer, his assistant director, the actor Chishu Ryu. All regard the late director with a sense of humility and respect bordering on awe; one refers to him as a "king."
Despite the evident fondness and open-hearted curiousity with which Wenders approaches all he encounters, there is an air of studied detachment to TOKYO-GA which tends to distance the viewer. The feeling is not helped by Wenders's laconic, unimpassioned voice-overs. The notable exception, and almost certainly the most affecting incident in the movie, is an interview with Ozu's former assistant director, who, after lengthy reminiscence, is overcome by emotion at the memory of his mentor, and tearfully thanks Wenders and asks him to leave, turning away from the camera in embarassment. It is here, for the first time, that we really sense the passion that Ozu and his movies inspire in people.
At one point, Wenders meets fellow German director Wernor Herzog. Standing on the observation ring of Tokyo Tower, backdropped by the city's seemingly infinite skyline, a monument to the bewildering complexity of human achievement, Herzog proclaims his belief that there are few "pure" images left in the world and one must go to great lengths to find them, and he would like to go into space for this purpose. Wenders acknowledges Herzog's point, but tells us that in Tokyo he finds all the "pure" images he needs.
TOKYO-GA thus becomes a refutation of Herzog's argument: "pure" images are everywhere, if you can find them, and Wenders can. Perhaps the most remarkable are discovered during his trip to a factory that manufactures the mouthwatering artificial dishes displayed in the windows of Japanese restaurants. These representations of food are, at a distance, indistinguishable from the real thing. Wenders finds men assembling the imitation dishes with care and precision, consulting blueprints as they construct each one. It is a task which seems surreal at first--more effort is spent on the fake food than would be on cooking the actual meal--but Wenders takes the time to show us the craft with which the men perform their labour. Indeed, it is not surprising that he is sympathetic to their efforts. What they are doing, after all, is approximating the real by means of the artificial--like Ozu, like Wenders, like cinema.
Review by David Dalgleish (subjective.freeservers.com) -- January 29th, 2000
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