Ihara Saikaku was a writer who lived in 17th century Japan. Ihara started his career writing poetry, but later moved on to write his best-known work: novels about the peculiar sex lives of the rich merchant families. Ihara's work has not been adapted to film that much, though one notable exception would be Mizoguchi's "Oharu" (1952)."Koshoku ichidai otoko" (A Lustful Man, 1962) is loner director Masumura Yasuzo's adaptation of a novel, that came out in 1682. By looking at the film, you would never guess that, as this is an absurdly funny, quick-witted and quickly-paced film, that is years ahead of its time.
Ichikawa Raizo is a film star for a reason, but sometimes the dull, unimaginative films Daiei gave him made the actor look wooden and self-important. I had for a long time thought that in most films, Ichikawa's potential is not fully used. After witnessing this film, I was sure about it. For most of the time, the studio has used him wrong. For it so happens that Raizo is also a fantastic comedian, who easily carries this narrative and makes it better with his performance.
Raizo plays a young man named Yonosuke. He is the son of a rich merchant, a classic "Scrooge" figure, to whom we are first introduced. The father is a treasure of a character. For instance, he sees that his wife is cleaning, and asks what rag she is using . After examining the dirty rag, he quickly notes that she can wear it for at least another year. Yonosuke is portrayed in contrast to everything that surrounds him. He is an obsessive woman-chaser, who treats every woman as a goddess. He views sex as something, that can give THE WOMEN pleasure, and so it is his desire to make every goddess as happy as possible, for at least a brief moment.
The film follows Yonosuke's travels from one town to the next. Around him we see the tragic lives of Japan's poorest people, which is anything but funny. Even to this work Masumura brings his societal edge. We meet a woman who drowned her child because she could not feed him, another woman who gets hanged, woman who gets killed with a sword, and so on. Characters die suddenly and unexpectedly, and in the weird, offbeat style of the film these serious scenes take nothing away from the comedy.
For this is a very funny comedy. The point of the film is, that women should be treated well. The protagonist says that if you view a woman as a goddess, she will stay that way, but if after marrying her you star treating her as a witch, she will turn into one. (Feudal) Japan is portrayed as a society, that systematically hates women, and the protagonist of the film searches for an escape, even though he himself is a man! The ending, which I will not spoil, is a nice change for the endings of Mizoguchi's feudal pictures. Then again, this film rebels just as much against samurai films. The film shows, that Japan's past had nothing proud and glorious, but instead the past was full imperfect individuals and suffering. The hedonistic lifestyle of the protagonist is wonderfully unusual, as if he had no clue how one is supposed to act in a jidai-geki film.
This is a weird, gruesome and lovely comedy full of colorful characters and sequences that work well. The screenplay is amazing, and the whole narrative sports a unique, but natural flow. This is my favorite Raizo performance by a long shot. Masumura is also brave by being enough of a pioneer to venture into depicting Japan's sexual minorities, transvestites and homosexuals. They are just part of the cast of characters, nothing more scandalous than anything else in the film. a high recommendation.
