No Regrets for Our Youth
No Regrets for Our Youth (わが青春に悔なし, Waga seishun ni kuinashi) is a 1946 film written and directed by Akira Kurosawa. It is based on the 1933 Takigawa incident.[1]
No Regrets for Our Youth | |
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Directed by | Akira Kurosawa |
Produced by | Keiji Matsuzaki |
Written by | Eijirō Hisaita Akira Kurosawa Keiji Matsuzaki |
Starring | Setsuko Hara Susumu Fujita Denjirō Ōkōchi |
Music by | Tadashi Hattori |
Cinematography | Asakazu Nakai |
Edited by | Akira Kurosawa |
Production company | |
Distributed by | Toho Company Ltd. |
Release date |
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Running time | 110 minutes |
Country | Japan |
Language | Japanese |
The film stars Setsuko Hara, Susumu Fujita, Takashi Shimura and Denjirō Ōkōchi. Fujita's character was inspired by the real-life Hotsumi Ozaki, who assisted the famous Soviet spy Richard Sorge and so became the only Japanese citizen to suffer the death penalty for treason during World War II. The film is in black-and-white and runs 110 minutes.[2]
Plot
The film begins in 1933. Students at Kyoto Imperial University protest the Japanese invasion of Manchuria. Prominent professor Yagihara (Denjiro Okochi) is relieved of his post because of his views against fascism. The professor's daughter Yukie (Setsuko Hara) is courted by two of her father's students: Ryukichi Noge (Susumu Fujita) and Itokawa (Akitake Kôno). Itokawa is equable and moderate while Noge is fiery and a radical leftist. Although she fights with him vigorously, Yukie is eventually drawn toward Noge.
Noge disappears following an anti-militarist student protest, the result of being arrested and spending four years in jail. By the time Itokawa, now a prosecutor for the government, tells Yukie of Noge's whereabouts, he has been out of jail for a year. He warns her that he is a changed man and no longer how Yukie remembered him.
Itokawa brings Noge over to the Yagihara residence. During dinner, Professor Yagihara mentions that Noge would not have been released unless the government was convinced that Noge had "converted" from his radical ways. Noge confirms this and says that Itokawa vouched for him and had even found him a job in the army.
After realizing that Noge has changed from his days at university, Yukie excuses herself from the dinner table and locks herself in her room. Her mother eventually tells her that the young men are leaving. Yukie is reluctant to see them out, but once her mother tells her that Noge is leaving for China she decides to see Noge one last time to say goodbye.
After Noge's departure, Yukie begins to pack for Tokyo and has a deep conversation with her father. For three years in Tokyo, Yukie works in menial jobs to get by. One day she runs into Itokawa and is told that Noge is in the city. She goes to Noge's offices, but is reluctant to reconnect. Yukie is shown outside of the offices several times until eventually Noge notices her. They spend several years together and get married.
Yukie discovers that Noge is involved in dangerous and illegal activities, but they agree that she should not know exactly what they are. Noge is arrested the night before his plans are to go into effect. Yukie is interrogated, but she proffers no information. She is treated badly during the interrogations but Itokawa is eventually able to free her.
Her parents take the train into Tokyo where Yukie's father meets up with Itokawa, thanks him for what he has done and informs him that he intends to represent Noge in court. Itokawa mournfully responds that Noge died the night before. Yukie is crushed. She brings his ashes to his parents, farmers in the countryside, and tells them she is his wife. Noge's father rejects her, believing that she has come to mock them because their son was convicted of being a spy but Yukie stays and works the rice fields with them. They are scorned and harassed in their village, and Yukie tries to convince them of her sincerity and that their son was a good man. The work in the rice fields is hard on her, but she is determined to prove her mettle, even to the point of working through a severe fever.
The night that Yukie and her mother-in-law finally finish planting all of the fields, the neighbors sneak in and destroy their work. When Yukie mourns the vandalism, Noge's father finally accept her and their son is redeemed in their eyes. At the end of the war, Professor Yagihara is reinstated and Noge is honored for his antiwar efforts. Yukie returns to Kyoto to visit her parents. Yukie's mother invites her to stay since it seems her daughter has achieved her goal: Noge's parents are no longer ashamed of their son. However, Yukie now feels more comfortable planting rice than playing the piano, and sees the value in the social work that still must be done in the village so she returns to Noge's parents.
Cast
- Setsuko Hara - Yukie Yagihara
- Susumu Fujita - Ryukichi Noge
- Denjirō Ōkōchi - Professor Yagihara
- Haruko Sugimura - Madame Noge
- Eiko Miyoshi - Madame Yagihara
- Kokuten Kōdō - Mr. Noge
- Akitake Kōno - Itokawa
- Takashi Shimura - Police Commissioner 'Poison Strawberry' Dokui
- Taizō Fukami - Minister of Education
- Masao Shimizu - Professor Hakozaki
- Haruo Tanaka - Student
- Kazu Hikari - Detective
- Hisako Hara - Itokawa's Mother
- Shin Takemura - Prosecutor
Reissues
The Criterion Collection published a DVD of the film in its Eclipse series.[3] It is available to view for free in some US cities via the Kanopy website.
References
- Yoshimoto, Mitsuhiro (2000). Kurosawa: Film Studies and Japanese Cinema. Duke University Press. p. 119. ISBN 0-8223-2519-5.
- Galbraith, Stuart (1996). The Japanese Filmography: A Complete Reference to 209 Filmmakers and the Over 1250 Films Released in the United States, 1900 Through 1994. McFarland. p. 307. ISBN 978-0-7864-0032-4.
- No Regrets for our Youth
External links
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