The "Otoko wa Tsurai yo" film series has long been loved in Japan since the first film in 1969 to the 50th released in 2019. The main character, Torajiro (commonly called Tora-san) is from the Shibamata area of Tokyo. The stories of humanity provoking both laughter and tears unfold as Tora-san travels the country peddling his wares.

From January 2022 to March 2023, the Maison de la culture du Japon à Paris in France is screening all 50 films in this "Otoko wa Tsurai yo" series. It is proving extremely successful, with audience members totaling 7,521 people as of January 21st, 2023.

The French journalist, Claude Leblanc is knowledgeable about this series directed by Yoji Yamada and has spoken at a screening event. He wrote about what he believes is the appeal of "Otoko wa Tsurai yo" and Director Yoji Yamada.

Text: Claude Leblanc

"Otoko wa Tsurai yo" sparked a strong enthusiasm for the series nearly 40 years ago

"Okaeri." This expression used to welcome someone who returns home was probably one of the only ones I understood when I saw for the first time a film of the series "Otoko wa Tsurai yo" by Yoji Yamada. That was almost 40 years ago.

I had been invited to spend a few weeks with a family in Tochigi Prefecture. As a beginner in the Japanese language, I must admit that I didn’t understand much, and the day we saw a film of Tora-san, the main character of the series, together at the theater, I hardly understood any of the dialogue except for this "Okaeri" pronounced with emotion by Sakura, the main character’s sister, played by Chieko Baisho. Because of the language barrier, this first encounter with Yamada’s work could have been the last.

However, the film "Otoko wa Tsurai yo: Tora-san’s Forbidden" Love made a deep impression on me. I was touched by the deep humanity surrounding the characters, the daily life in the Shibamata district, the discovery of a region I didn’t know, and of course the comedy of certain situations. I was also struck by the well-being that the film seemed to have brought to the audience. After the screening, the smiles on people’s faces and the animated discussions about the film within the family had caught my attention. I had never felt such enthusiasm after a film.

On my return to France, I thought a lot about this, especially as before my departure from Japan I had bought a book written by Yoji Yamada by chance. It was a collection of articles published in newspapers and magazines in which the filmmaker talked about both his life and his film experience. As I progressed in Japanese, I understood his approach better.

I had to wait five years before being able to find Yamada’s world. My move to Japan for several years allowed me to immerse myself in the work of this filmmaker who had already had a 30-year career and 62 films to his credit.

Yoji Yamada, a rare filmmaker who depicted Japan from the perspective of ordinary people

Despite this experience, he remained unknown abroad, at least in France. For me, this was incomprehensible because as I discovered his filmography, I became aware of his talent, the influence of his work and his weight in the history of Japanese cinema. I even came to think that the absence of Yoji Yamada in books on Japanese cinema published in France was like writing a book on French theatre without mentioning Molière.

The question is not whether or not one likes the director’s films, but rather to understand their influence in the country. Was it acceptable to ignore a work that millions of Japanese followed with passion? Was it acceptable to despise a filmmaker whose work portrayed Japan from below in a way that other filmmakers rarely did? The answer is of course no.

Indeed, Yamada’s films, first and foremost his famous series "Otoko wa Tsurai yo", allowed me to discover a Japan that until then had never been revealed to me in the works distributed in France. Yasujiro Ozu’s work, which was highly acclaimed, told the story of the life of the Tokyo bourgeoisie or the lower middle class, while Akira Kurosawa’s films, which were also highly acclaimed, were essentially about old Japan. The other filmmakers recognized in France belonged to the Nouvelle Vague and for the most part showed an urban and protesting Japan. Very few spoke of the Japan of the little people and ventured far from the large urban centers.

It was thanks to Tora-san that I understood the notion of "furusato", “the hometown”, so dear to the Japanese. It is also thanks to him that I was able to travel all over Japan. As incredible as it may seem, there are only 3 prefectures out of the 47 in Japan that have never been visited by the famous salesman Tora-san. So, for a foreigner like me, who was looking for knowledge about the country, all these films have become great sources of information.

The essence of Yamada’s work is a "universal humanism" that transcends borders

The actress Chieko Baisho once said in an interview that the series was ultimately "a very long documentary". This is absolutely right. From the first film in 1969 to the last one in 2019, even though there was a 22-year gap between the 49th and 50th films of the series, viewers were able to see Japan evolve and take the measure of its social transformations.

In the first episodes, youth is omnipresent, including in rural areas. But at the turn of the 1980s, it was mainly the elderly who were noticeable, as in "Otoko wa Tsurai yo: Tora-san, the Go-Between" (1985) or "Otoko wa Tsurai yo: Tora-san’s Salad-Day Memorial" (1988). In his films, Yoji Yamada has always been an attentive observer of Japanese society and has been able to highlight certain excesses. I think this also explains the success of his work in Japan. A lot of Japanese people found themselves in his films, whether it was the adventures of Tora-san or the 41 other feature films he directed.

In a way, Yoji Yamada is the "missing link" of Japanese cinema as it has often been presented abroad. Of course, there is the responsibility of foreign distributors and critics who considered the filmmaker as the representative of an outdated system challenged by the Nouvelle Vague. But there is no denying that responsibility also lies with the Japanese side for not making the effort to present his work in a way that could be understood by audiences abroad. I have always fought against this preconceived idea because the essence of Yamada’s work is carried by a universal humanism to which someone in France or China can be as sensitive as a Japanese person.

What characterizes this director’s cinema is his desire to sublimate the "humanity" of each of his characters with their strengths and weaknesses. Whether you watch "Home from the Sea" (1972), "A Class to Remember" (1993), "The Twilight Samurai" (2002) or any part of the Otoko wa Tsurai yo series, you will always be touched by the humanism that emerges. Deep down, I have always believed that Yoji Yamada’s films were capable of appealing to an international audience.

The screening of all 50 "Otoko wa Tsurai yo" films at the Maison de la culture du Japon à Paris ends a great success

In November 2021, I had the privilege of presenting "Where Spring Comes Late" (1970) at the Festival des 3 Continents in Nantes. After the screening, while I was having a drink at a café, some spectators came up to me and said, "Thank you!" I took this unprecedented reaction as an expression of a desire to see more.

At about the same time, the Maison de la culture du Japon à Paris was undertaking the retrospective "One Year with Tora-san" through 2022, which consisted of screening all 50 films in the "Otoko wa Tsurai yo" series. The promoters of this initiative wondered whether the Parisian public would respond well to this ambitious project. I was confident that Tora-san, Sakura and all the other characters would be able to captivate them as they had done with me for almost 40 years.

With full houses at most of the screenings, the fears of the Maison de la culture du Japon à Paris were quickly put to rest. And on the faces of the audience, there was the same expression that Japanese viewers have when they come out of a Tora-san screening. French audiences are amused by the antics of the salesman and moved by his misadventures in love, but they also appreciate this opening up to a Japan they did not know, far from the postcards and images conveyed by the media.

His films leave the viewer with the impression that they have discovered something new each time, whereas some critics, like the American James Bailey in Variety, believe that, “anyone who has seen one of these films has virtually seen them all.” But if this were true, the series would not have been so successful for nearly 30 years in Japan and it would not have the same success in France more than 50 years after the first installment was released.

Yoji Yamada’s filmmaking approach leaves you with the impression of a master craftsman

This is why we must continue to promote his work, because it occupies an essential place in the history of contemporary cinema, just as it is indispensable for appreciating Japan in dimensions that have been little explored until now..

I am thinking, for example, of his trilogy of period dramas – "The Twilight Samurai", "The Hidden Blade" (2004), and "Love and Honor" (2006) – which endeavor to describe the world of the samurai in its historical reality instead of focusing on the spectacular fights, even if the filmmaker does not forget to film them. In the same way, these films about war – "Kabei: Our Mother" (2008), "The Little House" (2014), and "Nagasaki: Memories of My Son" (2015) – allow for a reflection on the state of mind that prevailed at the time.

Over the course of his life as a filmmaker, Yoji Yamada has built up a varied body of work from which one can always draw deep emotions. One is left with the impression that they are dealing with the work of a master craftsman. In the book I bought in 1984 after my first meeting with Tora-san, Yamada wrote: “I want to feel the same way as those painters who have been painting the same mountains for five or ten years, or those potters who have been making the same shape for years. Even if the landscape or the form, which we look at, is the same, the thoughts that are projected onto it must be different year after year, and they must also evolve with time.” With this mindset, there is no doubt that his works are masterpieces.