Release date: July 13. 1956
Director: Kunio Watanabe
Studio: Toho
Cast: Keiju Kobayashi, Hisaya Morishige, Asami Kuji, Yoko Tsukasa, Yasuko Nakata, Norihei Miki, Akihiko Hirata, George Luiker et al
Availability: Available on DVD from amazon.co.jp.
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This is the third entry in the long-running "Shachō" (company president) series, none of which, as far as I know, are subtitled or even really known about in the West. The series is comprised of 33 films released across 14 years, and there are also six films considered supplemental/tie-in works. Harikiri Shachō is the only Shachō film Hirata had a role in, so it's the only one I've seen. Morishige plays Heitaro Okanda, the president of a bicycle manufacturing company, and Kobayashi is his secretary, Kazuo Suyama. The dynamic between the two is what makes a lot of the humor in Harikiri Shachō and, I would assume, the rest of the series. Morishige thinks he's the straight man, but he's really the comedy relief, and Kobayashi is the more relatable everyman.
And that's harikiri, not hara-kiri; nobody disembowels themselves in this film. "Harikiri" means something like "with all one's might", at least according to Papago.
Who's ready for ✨business✨? No subtitles here so I gotta put my thinking cap on. There is actually a little bit of English in this! But not much.
Okanda is newly married to a former chanson singer named Chieko (Asami Kuji) at the beginning of the film. His company, Taiyo Bicycle, also brings in a young woman named Harue (Yoko Tsukasa) for her English skills, so that she can work in the export department and speak with overseas buyers. Suyama is quite taken with her.
Dropping in on this series as an outside observer is really interesting. Even without being familiar with the context, I can tell Morishige is putting everything into his performance as the president. He might come off comedic sometimes, but when he gets up on a platform and starts giving a speech about selling bicycles - even though his secretary has to jump in and correct things here and there - he sounds like the president of a country, not just a company.
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| unrestrained summer fun |
Taiyo Bicycle has to keep expanding, and Okanda goes to Sengoku, the president of one of the company's shareholders, to ask for a loan. Sengoku brings Okanda to his home for a traditional dinner and a night of entertainment, but Okanda has trouble fitting in as he doesn't smoke or drink excessively due to some kind of heart problem. It is a pretty bogus time.
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| pictured: pretty bogus time |
Okanda escapes, but Suyama, who stays behind, finds out that Harue, the new hire who caught his eye, is the daughter of the host's landlady. While the bad vibes continue in the other room, Suyama and Harue sit down in the kitchen to drink coffee (with straws?) and Harue tells Suyama that Sengoku also has a son named Takao:
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| actual quote from the movie: "chotto handsome, dessho?" [roughly: "kinda handsome, huh?"] |
Then there's a beauty pageant, because there's always a beauty pageant. A lot of pretty girls ride around on bicycles and have their measurements taken by Okanda and his staff; the effort gives Okanda a nosebleed. They also have a parade with all the contestants.
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| they really are not selling bicycles like they used to anymore |
The winner, a girl named Momoko (Yasuko Nakata), gets to hang out in the president's office, sit behind the desk, smoke cigarettes, stuff like that. Unfortunately this was scheduled pretty poorly, and George Marner, the representative of an American company looking to contract with Taiyo Bicycle, comes in as Momoko is putting on her bodice with assistance from the president. He's immediately a mega creep to Momoko before getting down to business, with Harue translating. His fascination with Momoko will continue until he exits the film.
White boy George suggests a cycling trip with Okanda and all of the other Miss Cycle contestants to test out their products. There's some mambo music, everybody shakes a leg, much better vibes than the super awkward dinner with Sengoku earlier.
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| guest star: this cow |
(I looked up George Luiker, the actor who plays George, and apparently he is the child of Estonian and Armenian parents and had grown up in the Soviet Union before becoming a naturalized Japanese citizen and taking the name Joji Ruikawa. This was his first role. He is fluent in Japanese, which his character hides from Okanda for some reason, but when it comes time to try to impress Momoko, all bets are off.)
Hirata's character, Takao, finally enters the picture while Okanda and everyone are on their cycling mini-vacation. I'm really not sure what the point of this character was; both him and Suyama are photographers, so it seems like there's a setup for a love triangle, but Takao is in one scene for about 30 seconds and doesn't get brought up again, so... alright.
Okanda's wife, meanwhile, discovers photos of her husband at the Miss Cycle pageant, measuring some other girl's thighs. Later she also catches him getting into a car with Momoko. At the same time, Suyama attempts to confess his love to Harue, and she's SUPER not into it. He gives a rousing speech, from what of it I could understand, and at the end asks her to marry him, but she wants absolutely none of that. Or... does she? You know the movie is from the '50s when it takes the girl slapping the guy and telling him to get lost a few times for her to realize she actually does like him after all.
Eventually Chieko ends up at the same nightclub as Okanda and Momoko. There's more mambo music. Okanda mistakes some random white guy for George Marner. On the dance floor Okanda gets too into it and loses his shoe while mambo-ing with Momoko, and it's Chieko who finds it for him. They go home and she confronts him with the pictures. He tries to explain (and calls her "o-baka-san" in the process - I did not realize there was basically a polite way of calling somebody an idiot) but she throws him out of their bedroom.
Okanda goes back to Sengoku, who won't listen to him anymore, and Marner leaves for America. All seems lost and Okanda goes up to the roof where Suyama catches him and thinks he's about to commit suicide - he's not, but Suyama delivers a pep talk anyway and it puts the wind back in Okanda's sails. He makes up with Chieko, too, and soon he gets a telegram from Marner, agreeing to the contract. The film ends with Harue and Okanda leaving for America to meet with him.
This was a good time. Odd pacing, though, with everything taking a sudden downturn and then getting wrapped up all within the last fifteen minutes. There's a surprising amount of fanservice for its time, and it gets kind of gross, with Momoko calling Okanda "papa" and him being overly friendly with her, and then having to explain it to his wife, even though none of it was romantic. It's a really dated movie.
Still, fun! Older comedies are sometimes a lot easier for me to watch as a non-Japanese speaker because the exaggerated physical humor makes the plot easier to follow. Seeing Keiju Kobayashi that young was also funny, since I'm used to him playing very serious, mature characters. I don't know if I'd watch 33 of these movies, but it would be very interesting to see the evolution of the series, especially toward the late '60s, because this one seemed so solidly a product of its time that any kind of societal change would render its premise untenable.
Hirata's in this for literally one scene (if you don't count the photo of him Harue shows Suyama), but we're used to that around here.
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