Daibutsu kaigen / Dedication of the Great Buddha

Teinosuke Kinugasa: 大佛開眼 / Daibutsu kaigen / Dedication of the Great Buddha (JP 1952) with Kazuo Hasegawa (Tatedo no Kunihito) and Machiko Kyo (Mayame).

大佛開眼 / [Consacrazione al grande Buddha]

    JP 1952. Director: Teinosuke Kinugasa.

    Ass. regia: Kenji Misumi. Sog.: Hideo Nagata. Scen.: Ryuichiro Yagi. F.: Kohei Sugiyama. Scgf.: Kisaku Ito. Mus.: Ikuma Dan. Int.: Kazuo Hasegawa (Tatedo no Kunihito), Machiko Kyo (Mayame), Mitsuko Mito (Tachibana no Sakuyako), Sumiko Hidaka (Omiya no Morime), Denjiro Okochi (Gyoki), Sakae Ozawa (Kuninaka no Kimimaro), Yataro Kurokawa (Fujiwara no Nakamaro), Tatsuya Ishiguro (Ogusa no Kumotari). Prod.: Masaichi Nagata per Daiei. 35 mm. D.: 128’. Bn.
    Unreleased in Finland.

    Language: Japanese. E-subtitles in English and Italian by Chiara Saretta.

    Copy from NFAJ. Courtesy of Kadokawa Corporation.

    Il Cinema Ritrovato, Bologna, 2023: Teinosuke Kinugasa: From Shadow to Light.

    Introduced by Alexander Jacoby and Johan Nordström

    Viewed at Jolly Cinema, 24 June 2023.

Alexander Jacoby and Johan Nordström (Bologna catalog 2023): " While the majority of jidaigeki (Japanese period films) are set in the Edo Period (1603-1868) or in the Era of Warring States (Sengoku jidai) that preceded it, Kinugasa was something of a specialist in period films set in a more remote past. Kinugasa’s most famous sound film, Jigokumon (shown at Il Cinema Ritrovato 2015) is set in the Heian Era (794-1185). This film, made the year before, is set even earlier, in the Nara Period (710-784), when the city of Heijokyo, now Nara, south of present-day Kyoto, became the country’s first permanent capital. Under the acknowledged influence of Tang dynasty China and fired by zeal for the then recently imported creed of Buddhism, Japan attained a new level of cultural sophistication and artistic achievement. "

" The film focuses on the creation of one of Japan’s iconic monuments, the Great Buddha enshrined in the vast temple of Todaiji in Nara (which until the late 20th century remained the largest wooden building in the world). In a heavily fictionalised version of events, Kazuo Hasegawa plays the architect hired to create the idol, and the film charts the conflict with those opposed to its creation. The film was based on a successful 1940 play by Hideo Nagata (1885-1949), an author of modern shingeki theatre who was himself the son of a priest, albeit in Japan’s other traditional religion of Shinto. It was a big budget production with contributions from many expert technical staff as well as a starry cast led by Kazuo Hasegawa and Machiko Kyo (1924-2019). While Joseph Anderson and Donald Richie were later to dismiss the film as doing “no credit to its director”, it was considered important enough to be submitted to the 1953 Cannes Film Festival, where it played in competition, losing out to Henri-Georges Clouzot’s The Wages of Fear (Le Salaire de la peur). Kinugasa would scoop the Palme d’Or the following year for Jigokumon. " Alexander Jacoby and Johan Nordström

AA: This magnificent period epic about the creation of a mighty sacred artwork brings to mind Agony and Ecstasy. It is about court intrigue, political intrigue, rivalry and jealousy between artists. It is also a drama of love versus duty: the architect is so committed to his mission that he neglects Mayame who launches one of the heinous plans to sabotage the creation of the mighty Buddha monument. 

Gorgeous in visual design, historical detail, cinematography and mise-en-scène, this film is a breathtaking and compelling experience.

I was also thinking that Andrei Tarkovsky may have seen this film. At least there are affinities, including in the poetry of rain. Water was for Tarkovsky the key image in "sculpting in time". The casting of the church bell in Andrei Rublev has a similar epic and sacred atmosphere, also in the celebration of teamwork in creating a huge monument.

I hope that the negatives and other 35 mm originals survive. This print has a duped look like that of a blowup from 16 mm.