Funeral Parade of Roses (1969)

The trials and tribulations of Eddie and other transvestites in Japan.

Director:

Toshio Matsumoto

Writer:

Toshio Matsumoto

Stars:

Pîtâ, Osamu Ogasawara, Yoshimi Jô

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Pîtâ	...	Eddie
Osamu Ogasawara	...	Leda
Yoshimi Jô	...	Jimi
Koichi Nakamura	...	Juju
Flamenco Umeji	...	Greco
Saako Oota	...	Mari
Tarô Manji	...	Nora
Toyosaburo Uchiyama	...	Guevara
Mikio Shibayama	...	Philosopher
Wataru Hikonagi	...	Sabu
Fuchisumi Gomi	...	Piro
Chieko Kobayashi	...	Okei
Yô Satô	...	Radon
Keiichi Takenaga	...	Humpback
Mamoru Hirata

Storyline

While dealing drugs on the side, Gonda operates the Genet, a gay bar in Tokyo where he has hired a stable of transvestites to service the customers. The madame or lead "girl" of the bar is Leda, an older, old fashioned geisha-styled transvestite with who Gonda lives and is in a relationship. Arguably, the most popular of the girls working at the bar now is Eddie, a younger, modern transvestite. Like Leda, Eddie lives openly as a woman. Eddie's troubled life includes her father having deserted the family when she was a child, and having had a difficult relationship with her mother following, she who mocked Eddie's ability to be the man the of the family. Gonda enters into a sexual relationship with Eddie, who he promises to make madame of the bar, replacing Leda in both facets of his life, with Eddie having threatened to quit otherwise. While Leda suspects what Gonda and Eddie are up to, Gonda tells Leda what she wants to hear, much as he tells Eddie what she wants to hear. As this ...

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Plot Keywords:

gay | tokyo japan | gay bar | male nudity | stabbing | 

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Genres:

Drama

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Certificate:

Not Rated

Did You Know?

Trivia

One short but prominent scene in the film takes place in an alley, with the characters standing in front of five Japanese posters for Pier Paolo Pasolini's "Oedipus Rex." Given the plot of the film, this eventually comes to constitute a significant allusion.

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Goofs

[All goofs for this title are spoilers.]

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Quotes

Eddie: This is my first movie and I'm interested. My circumstances are like his. That's one reason. And the gay life is portrayed beautifully.

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Connections

References The Face of Another (1966)

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Soundtracks

Orphée aux enfers
Composed by Jacques Offenbach

User Reviews

Japanese New Wave's diamond

Set in late 60's Tokyo, Toshio Matsumoto's Funeral Parade of Roses is slightly based on Oedipus Rex diving deep into Tokyo's underground gay culture. Passionate and raw, it is a wonderful, harmonized mixture of documentary elements and avant-garde cinema. The movie follows Eddie, a gay boy whom I could not stop comparing to Edie Sedgwick for obvious reasons, portrayed by Shinnosuke Ikehata (commonly known as Peter), focusing on Eddie's past, fame and rivalry with the bar's Mama. The movie's title is a play on words: roses, bara (薔薇) in Japanese, is a symbol of homosexuality and also a shortened version of barazoku (薔薇族 ), the name of Japan's first modern gay men's magazine. One of Japanese New Wave's diamonds, Funeral Parade of Roses was a major influence on Stanley Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange.

Details

Country:

Japan

Language:

Japanese English

Release Date:

29 October 1970 (USA)

Also Known As:

Funeral Procession of Roses

Filming Locations:

Tokyo, Japan

Box Office

Cumulative Worldwide Gross:

$1,114

Company Credits

Production Co:

Art Theatre Guild (ATG), Matsumoto Production Company

Technical Specs

Runtime:

105 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1