Boy (1969)

A young boy reluctantly aids his swindling father in a threatening scam.

Director:

Nagisa Ôshima

Writer:

Tsutomu Tamura (screenplay)

Stars:

Fumio Watanabe, Akiko Koyama, Tetsuo Abe

3 wins.

Cast

Cast overview:
Fumio Watanabe	...	Takeo Omura
Akiko Koyama	...	Takeko Taniguchi
Tetsuo Abe	...	Toshio Omura
Tsuyoshi Kinoshita	...	Peewee

Storyline

A couple Takeo Omura and Takeko Kaniguchi travel across Japan with their two sons, the eldest, Toshio, who is biologically his but not hers. They are con artists, whose scam is for her to jump alongside moving vehicles feigning being hit and injured, while he, playing the outraged husband, negotiates with the worried driver for an unofficial cash settlement in return for not calling the police reporting the motorist's "guilt". She often does sustain minor injuries from the ruse. She believes that they will continue doing this work until they have enough money to settle down in one place, where he will get a legitimate job. However, he wants to continue the scam indefinitely as he, a veteran, claims that injuries he sustained during the war would prevent him from obtaining that legitimate work. When Toshio reaches age ten in 1966, they enlist him in the con, he now playing the accident victim, with Takeko now playing the concerned mother role. They even manufacture real bruises on ...

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Plot Keywords:

running away | con artist | stepmother | japan | dysfunctional family | 

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Genres:

Drama

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Details

Country:

Japan

Language:

Japanese

Release Date:

9 April 1970 (USA)

Also Known As:

Boy

Filming Locations:

Akita, Japan

Company Credits

Production Co:

Art Theatre Guild (ATG), Sozosha

Technical Specs

Runtime:

105 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Black and White (tinted) Color (Eastmancolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Goofs

While the boy is wandering through a village it is night time, at the ocean inlet it's dawn, but the following scenes are at night time again.

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Connections

Featured in The Story of Film: An Odyssey: New Directors, New Form (2011)

User Reviews

a sample of oshima's greatness

'Boy' is, below the surface, a scathing commentary on post-war Japan. The country has been consumed by greed and has taken Western ideals to its hilt. The parents exploiting their son for money strikes into the heart a family that is so far away from the respect and courtesy of old Japanese values.

As a contradiction, Oshima rejects the classical repertoire of Ozu or Mizoguchi and creates a radical language much more to his own invention. The soundtrack unsettles, the camera movement is slow and anxious ridden and the characters push against any sort of likability. The fact that a small boy is the most morally conscious out of a cast of adult characters is especially telling. Also used are still images and colour filters, almost a surefire way to portray the inner thoughts of a young boy who can't adequately express himself. The widescreen filming allows for much detail in the scenes, a rush of intricacies flood each shot. Exquisite to look at but also plenty to think about.

Oshima is usually volatile in his ideas and this leads him to be a not very consistent filmmaker but when his ideas align themselves like this, there are very few who could direct better.