Like all directors of his era, Hiroshi Shimizu made a series of National Policy propaganda films though he was often able to circumvent their requirements by focussing on themes that interested him more directly such as teamwork or childhood. Sayon’s Bell (サヨンの鐘, Sayon no Kane) is however an unavoidably propagandist film filled with praise for the Japanese empire and to modern eyes incredibly problematic in its depictions of the indigenous peoples of Taiwan many of whom did “volunteer” to serve in the Japanese imperial army a notable example being that of Li Kuang-hui who was the last Japanese soldier to be discovered hiding in the Indonesian jungle in 1974 having been recruited from the Amis people.
The film opens with a lengthy series of title cards explaining that the film is dedicated to the Takasago Volunteers, “Takasago” being, aside from the title of a famous noh play, the name Japanese gave to the indigenous people of Taiwan believing them to have been “civilised” by Japanese rule. Thus in the opening sequences, we see the role of the Japanese military personnel as essentially paternal. They are policemen, doctors, teachers, instructors, and directors of construction who are dedicated to raising the aboriginal people to level of Japanese citizens through forced assimilation.
Inspired by a real life incident that also inspired a popular song of an indigenous woman who drowned in a river while carrying the belongings of a Japanese policeman, the film uses the titular Sayon as an arbiter of Japaneseness enhanced by the casting of Li Koran, later known as Shirley Yamaguchi/Yamaguchi Yoshiko, who was actually Japanese but presented as Chinese in the propaganda cinema of the time having been born in Machuria and fluent in Mandarin. Somewhat awkwardly given that Sayon is supposed to be an indigenous woman herself, she is the one schooling the local children in how to be Japanese reminding them that they should “use Japanese properly” rather than their indigenous language and praising one young boy for abandoning his indigenous name and adopting that of “Taro” instead. Japanese rule in Taiwan was not as oppressive as it was in the other parts of the empire and they did have some local support thanks to their investments in infrastructure and modernisation. Nevertheless, they did attempt to enforce the use of the Japanese language and the taking of Japanese names though it should also be noted that the KMT government did exactly the same thing only with Mandarin when it gained control of the island.
That aside the indigenous people were often treated poorly in comparison to the rest of the of the population and we can see that the framing of them is often racist and derogatory such as when an abandoned baby is taken to the police and they remark that the indigenous community have too many children and they all look alike. The eligible men from the village, including Sayon’s love interest Saburo (Hatsu Shimazaki), have been sent to Japan for a kind of militarist re-education and are eagerly awaiting their opportunity to serve the emperor in the army. Though this may seem surprising, it apparently reflects a real fervour among indigenous men who were convinced to enlist by the money on offer and a campaign of rumours that suggested men who did not do so were unmanly and therefore unattractive to the local women. When the first round of volunteers is selected, a great amount of time is given to consoling the men who were not chosen many of whom protest and plead to volunteer their services.
In an effort to inject some drama the film includes a love triangle between Sayon, Saburo, and Mona (Kenzo Nakagawa) who is said to be moody out of jealousy and unrequited love for Sayon but later reveals he was only jealous of Saburo in respect of playing second fiddle to him as a worthy man of the village again eager to serve the Japanese emperor. Led by Li Koran, there are several renditions of a patriotic war song singing the praises of the Taiwanese army that read that like a call to arms, though the audience for this film is certainly domestic and it seems unlikely that it would be screened in these mountain villages in Taiwan.
The first part of the film is basically ethnography featuring picturesque scenes of the local scenery and footage of the indigenous people living the “simple, peaceful life” patronisingly described in the opening titles while there is some exoticisation of the aboriginal culture in the elaborate costumes and scenes of indigenous rituals. Perhaps the most shocking aspect is that Sayon is encouraged to break a traditional taboo by entering a sacred lake where women are forbidden to go lest they anger the god Uttofu. With her new cultural re-education, Sayon thinks Uttofu is a myth and goes to the lake to help Saburo assess it because the Japanese are planning to drain it to create a rice paddy. For this she is expected to drown herself in the water to placate Uttofu and is urged to do so by the tribal elders with the Japanese basically agreeing with them deciding that they should catch an animal to sacrifice and if that doesn’t work, while it’s “unfortunate”, Sayon should indeed hurl herself into the lake if the for the good of the empire rather than Uttofu.
It is quite odd to think that the Japanese military personnel would go along with human sacrifice rather than clamp down on a practice they would otherwise term backward, though in that light it’s impossible not to see her later death by drowning as a rejection of the “modernity” the colonial authorities represent and a re-assertion of indigenous culture. The bell referenced in the title refers to one given to the village to commemorate the incident bearing an inscription of Sayon’s name. When the KMT gained control of Taiwan, they erased the inscription on the bell and removed it as a symbol of Japanese rule though it was later restored after the end of martial law and the monument re-erected beside the bridge which was also named “Sayon’s Bridge” in a evocation of the complicated relationships between the three nations. The film is however rather uncomplicated in its themes which to modern eyes prove extremely unpalatable despite the often beautiful cinematography capturing the idyllic Taiwanese countryside.
Sayon’s Bell screens at the Museum of the Moving Image May 11 as part of Hiroshi Shimizu Part I: The Shochiku Years.
Female suffering in an oppressive society had always been at the forefront of Mizoguchi’s filmmaking even if he, like many of his contemporaries, found his aims frustrated by the increasingly censorious militarist regime. In some senses, the early days of occupation may not have been much better as one form of propaganda was essentially substituted for another if one that most would find more palatable. The first of his “women’s liberation trilogy”, Victory of Women (女性の勝利, 
Hiroshi Shimizu is best remembered for his socially conscious, nuanced character pieces often featuring sympathetic portraits of childhood or the suffering of those who find themselves at the mercy of society’s various prejudices. Nevertheless, as a young director at Shochiku, he too had to cut his teeth on a number of program pictures and this two part novel adaptation is among his earliest. Set in a broadly upper middle class milieu, Seven Seas (七つの海, Nanatsu no Umi) is, perhaps, closer to his real life than many of his subsequent efforts but notably makes class itself a matter for discussion as its wealthy elites wield their privilege like a weapon.
Shimizu, strenuously avoiding comment on the current situation, retreats entirely from urban society for this 1941 effort, Introspection Tower (みかへりの塔, Mikaheri no Tou). Set entirely within the confines of a progressive reformatory for troubled children, the film does, however, praise the virtues popular at the time from self discipline to community mindedness and the ability to put the individual to one side in order for the group to prosper. These qualities are, of course, common to both the extreme left and extreme right and Shimizu is walking a tightrope here, strung up over a great chasm of political thought, but as usual he does so with a broad smile whilst sticking to his humanist values all the way.
Isn’t it sad that it’s always the kids that end up hurt when parents fight? Throughout Shimizu’s long career of child centric cinema, the one recurring motif is in the sheer pain of a child who suddenly finds the other kids won’t play with him anymore even though he doesn’t think he’s done anything wrong. Four Seasons of Children (子どもの四季, Kodomo no Shiki) is actually a kind of companion piece to 
Windows on Worlds 