{"id":12739,"date":"2014-05-10T19:45:02","date_gmt":"2014-05-10T23:45:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/?p=12739"},"modified":"2014-07-16T15:26:01","modified_gmt":"2014-07-16T19:26:01","slug":"the-eclipse-viewer-episode-15-masaki-kobayashi-against-the-system","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/2014\/05\/10\/the-eclipse-viewer-episode-15-masaki-kobayashi-against-the-system\/","title":{"rendered":"The Eclipse Viewer Episode 15: Masaki Kobayashi Against the System"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"EV-15\"David and I are back with another episode of The Eclipse Viewer, the podcast dedicated to the Criterion Collection\u2019s Eclipse Series of DVDs.<\/p>\n

In this episode, we talk about Eclipse Series 38: Masaki Kobayashi Against the System.<\/p>\n

The first film we talk about, The Thick-Walled Room <\/em>(1956), was actually produced three years before its release. However, it was considered so provocative that the studio held on to it until 1956. With a screenplay by Kobo Abe and based on the real journals of B and C-class Japanese prisoners, The Thick-Walled Room<\/em> takes us to Sugamo Prison, where Emperor Tojo was executed in 1948. There we follow a handful of prisoner who, though guilty, were forced to commit their crimes by their superiors. Even now, in prison, these men are still being used as pawns.<\/p>\n

From prison to sports, I Will Buy You<\/em> (1956) is the second feature in the set. In this film, a young scout for a professional baseball team competes with other teams to secure the signature of a rising star. Everyone is wheeling and dealing<\/p>\n

Black River<\/em> (1956), the third film in the set, showcases a very young Tatsuya Nakadai in his first starring role as a kind of low-level leader of a criminal gang running amok around a U.S. military base curing the U.S. occupation of Japan. Central to the locale is a slum in which a host of the impoverished live and which may be torn down if those in charge can get the right amount of money. Add to this a love triangle between Nakadai’s brute, an idealistic university student, and the innocent — for a time — girl with the white parasol. Many consider this Kobayashi’s first truly great film.<\/p>\n

Lastly, we discuss The Inheritance<\/em> (1962), the film Kobayashi made right after he finished his ten-hour epic The Human Condition<\/em>. Scaling things back a bit from that mammoth film about World War II, here Kobayashi shows a group of people double-crossing one another in order to secure a dying wealthy man’s fortune.<\/p>\n

Corruption, betrayal, exploitation — all human nature, and all in Kobayashi’s line of sight.<\/p>\n

Please find the podcast, the shownotes, and plenty of links over at CriterionCast here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"Kobayashi_3D_Box_original\"<\/p>\n

In the next episode of The Eclipse Viewer, David and I will be discussing Eclipse Series 30: Sabu!,\u00a0covering these three films: Elephant Boy<\/em> (1937), The Drum<\/em> (1938), and Jungle Book<\/em> (1942).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

David and Trevor are back with The Eclipse Viewer 15: Masaki Kobayashi Against the System. Read the full post and get the link to the podcast<\/u><\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12740,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"libsyn-item-id":0,"libsyn-show-id":0,"libsyn-post-error":"","libsyn-post-error_post-type":"","libsyn-post-error_post-permissions":"","libsyn-post-error_api":"","playlist-podcast-url":"","libsyn-episode-thumbnail":"","libsyn-episode-widescreen_image":"","libsyn-episode-blog_image":"","libsyn-episode-background_image":"","libsyn-post-episode-category-selection":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_use_thumbnail":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_use_theme":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_height":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_width":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_placement":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_use_download_link":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_use_download_link_text":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_custom_color":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-explicit":"","libsyn-post-episode":"","libsyn-post-episode-update-id3":"","libsyn-post-episode-release-date":"","libsyn-post-episode-simple-download":"","libsyn-release-date":"","libsyn-post-update-release-date":"","libsyn-is_draft":"","libsyn-new-media-media":"","libsyn-post-episode-subtitle":"","libsyn-new-media-image":"","libsyn-post-episode-keywords":"","libsyn-post-itunes":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-episode-number":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-season-number":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-episode-type":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-episode-title":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-episode-author":"","libsyn-destination-releases":"","libsyn-post-episode-advanced-destination-form-data":"","libsyn-post-episode-advanced-destination-form-data-enabled":"","libsyn-post-episode-advanced-destination-form-data-input-enabled":false,"libsyn-post-episode-premium_state":"","libsyn-episode-shortcode":"","libsyn-episode-embedurl":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[469],"tags":[642],"coauthors":[505],"class_list":["post-12739","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-eclipse-viewer","tag-criterion-collection"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/EV-15.jpg?fit=300%2C300&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pqqvZ-3jt","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12739","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12739"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12739\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12743,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12739\/revisions\/12743"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12740"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12739"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12739"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12739"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=12739"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}