TOKYO, people will tell you, is always fascinating. Having lived there for some eight years when I still could walk kilometers, the city had always been a monumental memory for me. Even as the city seems to sprawl for miles and miles, the tiny nooks and crannies there are for souls either lost or wanting to lose themselves to something greater than them, except God.
There are the usual tourist sights—the red-light district of Shinkuku, with its fancy love motels of various architectural persuasions and designs; Ginza, with its well-dressed shoppers ready for the priciest and toniest stores; and Harajuku, the cosplay capital of the world with a train station that, on one side, faces the majestic Meiji Shrine and, on the other, the most whimsical boutiques and a population ready to change any regular person’s notion of costuming. But Tokyo is also Kanda, where once the supreme universities existed and where one can find a long street of bookstores and publishing houses selling everything from the subtlest of poetry to porn requiring modifiers greater than “gross”.
Whenever I travel to Tokyo, I would usually leave my luggage with the “takyu-bin” (which means “sending fast”). With just a small bag or even nothing with me at all, I would take the cheaper, slower train. The Japanese love speeding their transportation, thus, the two-hour ride from Narita has been shortened by faster trains. But I love the slower train especially when it is autumn, and the woods and meadows of Chiba remind you how nature is solely its own competition. It is through these rides that one sees the sense of color of the Japanese with homes in various shades of grays and beiges, a palette given to silences and subtleties as their cultures. But, hey, my friends would say I’m “Orientalizing”. Who cares?
I have recently rediscovered Tokyo. The city is a marvel in October, when it spreads the red carpet to usher in the Tokyo International Film Festival (TIFF). I have seen versions of it many years before, but it was two years ago when I was invited by the Japan Foundation to participate as a member of the media and film journalists from the Asean.
Each TIFF is, to say the least, unique. There were seasons when anime figures vied for attention on the red carpet at Roppongi Hills. This year, a creature is creating buzz even as this celebrity has made appearances in the past festivals. Godzilla is the name of this being and he will appear in the first TIFF cinema concert.
The concert will feature special guests, a live orchestra and the screening of the original Godzilla film made in 1954, directed by Ishirõ Honda, accompanied by the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra, which will perform the iconic soundtrack written by Akira Ifukube. True to the keen historical habit of Japanese, Kaoru Wada, a pupil of Ifukube’s, will direct the orchestra Before the screening and live performance, a talk, titled “Godzilla: Present, Past, Future”, will bring together for the first time three generations of Godzilla series creators, namely, Haruo Nakajima (Godzilla suit actor), Shogo Tomiyama (Heisei series producer) and Shinji Higuchi (Shin Godzilla director). They will all discuss what it is that attracts new generations of fans to Godzilla.
The film Godzilla has been digitally restored with Japanese and English subtitles. It runs for 97 minutes.
The 2017 edition of TIFF is the 30th. For this year, it has announced the Crosscut Asia section featuring the next generation of Southeast Asian cinema. This will be in collaboration with The Japan Foundation Asia Center.
The Japan Foundation Asia Center’s Crosscut Asia series showcases Asian films with a focus on specific countries, directors or themes. The first three editions featured Thailand, the Philippines and Indonesia. The fourth edition aims to cover a larger area of Southeast Asia, this year being the 50th anniversary of the formation of the Asean.
The section, called “Crosscut Asia #04: What’s Next From Southeast Asia”, will feature works from young filmmakers in Southeast Asia recommended by experts in the same region, such as Brillante Mendoza from the Philippines, who has won awards at the Berlin, Cannes and Venice film festivals, and whose works were featured in Crosscut Asia in 2015; Tran Anh Hung (Vietnam), who served as a member of the 28th TIFF jury and is known as Golden Lions winner at Venice with Cyclo; Apichatpong Weerasethakul (Thailand), Palme d’Or winner at Cannes with Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives, and as a visual artist, a participant in many exhibitions; and Garin Nugroho (Indonesia), who has shown 12 films at TIFF and served on the jury of the 19th TIFF.
The Japan Foundation is Japan’s principal independent administrative institution dedicated to carrying out cultural exchange initiatives throughout the world. The Asia Center, established in April 2014, is a division within the foundation that conducts and supports collaborative initiatives with its Asian—primarily Asean—counterparts. Through interacting and working together in Japanese-language education, arts and culture, sports, and grassroots and intellectual exchange, the Asia Center pursues to develop the sense of kinship and coexistence as neighboring inhabitants of Asia.
The TIFF started in 1985 as Japan’s first major film festival and the only Japanese film festival accredited by the International Federation of Film Producers Associations. Since then, TIFF has grown to become one of the largest film festivals in Asia. Every year in October, filmmakers and film fans of all ages gather in Tokyo to enjoy excellent films from around the world and TIFF’s many colorful events. These include the festival’s affiliated media content market TIFFCOM; seminars for students, professionals and business people; and symposiums and workshops for networking with the world’s film industries, developing international coproductions and promoting the global film business. The 30th TIFF will be held from October 25 to November 3.
The end of October, with already a nip in the air, is the season to be more fascinated with the most fascinating art form—the cinema.
And, yet, in my case, a fascination that does not require seasons is what I have with Feud, not the fight per se but the TV series from FX. The show follows the nearly immortal conflict with the nearly immortal divas in the persons of Joan Crawford and Bette Davis. Not necessarily in that order, just to be safe with fans and admirers of the two.
The last four episodes of the Feud see us through the period when the turbulent filming of the first and only pairing of Davis and Crawford in Whatever Happened to Baby Jane has wrapped. We know the story: Bette Davis was nominated for Best Actress and Joan Crawford was, to use the simplest term, snubbed by the academy. We also know that on the day of the Oscars, Crawford received for the absentee winner, Anne Bancroft (The Miracle Worker). That was no big deal. I don’t think the one accepting the trophy on behalf of the awardee becomes the winner. The task is nominal and is performed with lots of goodwill and grace. But the series allows us to be at the ringside or the consciousness of Davis and Crawford in those days. We’re told now that Bette Davis madly and badly wanted to win; we’re also told that Crawford wanted to steal the show from Davis.
A pathetic Crawford is delineated as she, with the irascible Hedda Hopper (Judy Davis as the woman whose pen forever drips with poison and envy), plotted to convince people to vote for other actresses. In this episode, the characters of Bancroft and Geraldine Page (nominated for Sweet Bird of Youth) are nearly assassinated.
What do really want out of Crawford and Davis?
The show repeatedly underscores how these two actresses were made by the Hollywood machinery, and that their makers were men.
These moguls, if we are to understand the premise, played with women who became too strong, too dominant. In the twilight of their careers, Crawford and Davis, as Feud implies, remained under the sway of the male-dominated machinery
I don’t buy these assumptions even as they have produced an age gilded with glamour. I like to believe in the authenticity of the persons of Joan and Bette as they came up with roles that have made them eternal.
Perhaps, a queer reading of Joan Crawford and Bette Davis would yield more compelling conclusions.
This doesn’t mean there are no new insights in the show. Without, perhaps, intending so, there are many scenes where Crawford and Davis are humanized. We know, of course, that fans don’t lap up the human aspects of their idols. But it’s good to witness them in their bedrooms, inside their homes, within their troubled respective souls.
There are trivial similarities between Crawford and Davis. Both are bothered by other icons: Crawford is irritated by the shadow of Greta Garbo; Davis isn’t amused by the absence of Katharine Hepburn. I love it when Crawford screams how she has outlived Garbo; we’re entertained when Davis bristles at the thought of Hepburn refusing to pose beside her.
In the end, I remain admirers of the crafts of Joan Crawford, whose incipient elegance I am discovering for the first time; and Bette Davis, whose performances have nothing to do with her person.
Enjoy Feud as footnotes, tiny citations on the well-researched lives of Joan Crawford and Bette Davis. For the truths in their geniuses, there are their works for us to judge and learn about some of the ultimate lessons in acting and film magic.
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