June 2015
—Narratives Woven from Inner Memories—
Keita Toda
Shoichiro Sasaki, former NHK drama director (born in 1936 in Tokyo), is known as a “legendary auteur” for his poetic images and innovative film-making technique. Last autumn, after an interval of 19 years since his last production for NHK, the director released his very first feature film Harmonics Minyoung, which demonstrated he is alive and kicking.
In addition, the fact that the same staff as 19 years ago rallied together for his new film surprised many. The author, Prof. Keita Toda, a former NHK filming department cameraman, has been watching Sasaki’s productions in real-time. He gazes into essence of Sasaki’s drama productions and explores the magnetism of his works and the driving force behind his inspiration.
The author illuminates the forming of an unrealistic world woven out of the director’s boyhood memory—a distinguished characteristic of his works—with his early productions in the 1970s such as Mother, Sasurai, Yumenoshima Shoujo, and Shiki: Yutopiano, and his intention for “seamless continuity of mind” or “circulation” in Sasaki’s River series in the 1980s, looking into the director’s unique film-making style, including his relationship with the production staff, approach to the cast, and his on-site production methods. Then, the author delves into the legendary auteur Shoichiro Sasaki himself, whose virtuosity is consummated in his latest film Harmonics Minyoung, based on the interviews with Sasaki and with his cameramen Tetsuro Katsuragi and Hideo Yoshida.