Sanshiro Sugata

Sanshiro Sugata (Sugata Sanshiro in the original) is a Japanese film from 1943, the directorial debut of Akira Kurosawa. It was produced by the Toho studio from Tsuneo Tomita's novel of 1942 and is the first film adaptation of that source. The story is set in Japan in the eighteen-eighties. Young Sanshiro Sugata studies judo under Shogoro Yano, the founder of the Shudokan school, and his path crosses those of the older jujutsu schools. In the plot, judo and jujutsu compete, among other things, for the contract to train the Tokyo police. The film sets the new judo against the traditional jujutsu of the Yoshin-ryu school and also shows the Shinmei Kassatsu-ryu school beside it. The hero's main technique is yamaarashi. The final duel takes place in tall susuki grass swaying in the wind on the Sengokuhara plain in Hakone. During the war the film was cut from 97 to 79 minutes; sources disagree about who made the cut, some saying censors, others unknown parties acting without permission. After the war, according to Japanese sources, the film was banned as "anti-democratic" and from 1952 it was shown only in the short version, because the original negative has not survived. Some of the missing scenes, among them Sanshiro's hard training, were later found in the Russian Gosfilmofond; the restored version runs 91 minutes. In 1945 Kurosawa made the sequel Zoku Sugata Sanshiro. The novel went on to receive further film versions from 1955, 1965, 1970 and 1977, as well as television adaptations.

Martial arts in this work

Origin

Filming began on 13 December 1942 at the Asama shrine in Yokohama; the scene in the river was shot in Handa in Aichi Prefecture, in water close to freezing. The final duel was filmed from 15 February 1943 on the Sengokuhara plain in Hakone, in susuki grass swaying in the wind; according to Japanese sources, the strong wind came only on the third day of shooting. Before the premiere on 25 March 1943 the film, as a new director's first work, went through approval by the Ministry of the Interior; Yasujiro Ozu, one of the examiners, rated it "120 points out of 100". It was released in the programme of so-called national films of the Information Bureau. For it, Kurosawa won in December 1943 the Sada Yamanaka Prize intended for new directors.

Fact and fiction

Tomita's novel, on which the film is based, is a roman à clef about the rivalry between the Kodokan and the Totsuka jujutsu school in the eighteen-eighties; the author's father, Tsunejiro Tomita, was a judoka. The film renames real people and institutions: the Kodokan is called the Shudokan in it, and master Shogoro Yano, played by Denjiro Okochi, is based on the founder of judo, Kano Jigoro. The character of Sanshiro Sugata is drawn from Shiro Saigo, one of the so-called Four Heavens of the Kodokan (Kodokan Shitenno), and from Sanpa Toka; he got his surname from the judoka Setsuo Sugata. Hansuke Murai has a model in Matsugoro Okuda and the rival Gennosuke Higaki in the jujutsu master Mataemon Tanabe.

People and martial arts

• Akira KurosawaDirector
• Susumu FujitaActor — as Sanshiro Sugata· Judo (portrays the art on screen)
• Denjiro OkochiActor — as Shogoro Yano· Judo (portrays the art on screen)

Awards

• Won · Národní filmová cena (Kokumin eiga-sho), cena povzbuzení (1943)
• Won · Cena Sadaa Yamanaky, nový režisér (Akira Kurosawa) (1943)