Featuring Benshi Performances by Midori Sawato
In Japan's rich tradition of oral narrative arts, with the advent of motion pictures it was only natural that a performer emerged to stand beside the silver screen and give voice to mute images in rhythmic patterns and modulated tones. This poet of early cinema, the benshi, interpreted films, making sense of the exotic, reinventing the familiar, repeating and rephrasing, performing all the roles. As with kabuki, noh, or bunraku, the musical intonation and dramatic effect of the movie storyteller's art are enjoyed even by those who do not understand Japanese.
We are pleased to present Midori Sawato, September 13 through 15, highlighting a month of rare silent films. Midori Sawato has performed as a professional benshi for almost thirty years, appearing at international film festivals as well as frequent engagements in Japan. She was a student of the late Shunsui Matsuda (whose recorded benshi narration for Jirokichi the Burglar is featured September 14) and has become Japan's foremost practitioner of the art of katsuben. Tirelessly sharing her passion for silent cinema, Ms. Sawato has received numerous awards for her art as well as her accomplishments in inspiring and educating others.
Included in her repertoire is A Diary of Chuji's Travels, which was voted the best Japanese film of all time in a 1959 Kinema Junpo (film critics') poll-even though for years the film was considered lost. The memories of those who knew the 1927 trilogy and the literature surrounding its absence had created a legend. Then, in 1991, portions of a nitrate print were found-amazingly-in Hiroshima, and this thrilling rediscovery confirmed the achievement of director Daisuke Ito. If only the stories of all the other missing films might have such a denouement. Still, over the past few decades a number of significant works have been recovered, often outside of Japan - in Brussels, London, Moscow. The series we present in September pays tribute to the National Film Center, Tokyo, and Matsuda Film Productions. Our colleagues' painstaking work of reconstruction and restoration has yielded treasures from an era of extraordinary creativity and experimentation in Japanese cinema.
-Mona Nagai, Film Collection Curator
A free program guide will be available at the screenings.
On September 16 Midori Sawato will meet with UC Berkeley faculty and students and participate in an interdisciplinary panel with Korean pyonsa Shin Chul. For further information please call 510-642-1412.
