Living Corpse

After studying English literature at the night school of the National English Society, he enrolled in the Shinpa (Fujisawa Asajiro) Tokyo School of Acting, where he learned modern dramaturgy and realism from Osanai Kaoru, the "father of new theater," who was a professor there. However, he was unable to make a living from new theater, so in 1917 he joined Nikkatsu Mukojima Studios, which at the time were churning out tragic new theater works, and the following year he released his first directorial work, "Dawn." He then made a film version of Tolstoy's "The Living Dead" (1918), which had been a huge success when it was staged by the Geijutsuza Theater. Although it was still within the realm of "moving pictures," his direction and acting direction showed a fresh willingness to break away from the old Shinpa mold, and his effective use of cutbacks, moving shots, and backlighting drew attention. At the time, most of the reform movement in Japanese cinema was essentially imitations of American films or adaptations of modern European dramas, but Tanaka, with his original screenplays for "Kyoya Eriten" (1922) and "Dance of the Skull" (1923), realistically depicted Japanese life from a Japanese perspective. "Kyoya Eriten," which tells the story of the decline of a long-established downtown store over the course of the changing seasons, was the first Japanese film to be called a "masterpiece," and Tanaka's achievements as a practitioner rather than a theorist of the reform movement were marked.

*Some of the terminology explanations that refer to "Living Corpse" are listed below.

Source | Heibonsha World Encyclopedia 2nd Edition | Information

…国民英学会の夜学で英文学を学んだのち，新派(藤沢浅二郎)の東京俳優学校に入学し，そこで教授をしていた〈新劇の父〉小山内（おさない）薫から近代劇のドラマトゥルギーや演技のリアリズムを学んだが，新劇では生計が立たず，1917年，当時は新派悲劇的作品を粗製していた日活向島撮影所に入り，翌18年，監督第1作《暁》を発表した。次いで，芸術座が舞台にのせて大成功したトルストイの《生ける屍》(1918)を映画化し，まだ〈活動写真〉の域を脱しきれないものではあったが，演出や演技指導には古い新派の型を破ろうとする新鮮な意欲が見られ，カット･バック，移動撮影，逆光線撮影などが効果的に使用されて注目を浴びた。当時の日本映画の革新運動の大部分は，その内実としてはアメリカ映画の模倣やヨーロッパ近代劇の翻案であったが，田中はオリジナルシナリオによる《京屋襟店（えりてん）》(1922)と《髑髏（どくろ）の舞》(1923)で，日本人の生活を日本人の視点から写実的に描き，とくに下町の老舗が没落するものがたりを四季の移り変りのなかで描いた《京屋襟店》は，〈傑作〉と呼ばれた最初の日本映画であり，田中はそれにより映画革新運動の理論家というよりはむしろ実践家としての業績を残した。…

※「《生ける屍》」について言及している用語解説の一部を掲載しています。

出典｜株式会社平凡社世界大百科事典 第２版について | 情報