The Cinema of Naruse Mikio: Women and Japanese Modernity
“The Cinema of Naruse Mikiopresents not only a deft and subtle run-through of the world of an important auteur, but also a virtual encapsulation of the intellectual history of Japanese cinema during its most important period, the 1930s–60s. Catherine Russell contextualizes Naruse in the commercial situation in which he worked and in the historical, social, political, and intellectual project of mid-twentieth-century Japan. I came away firmly believing that Naruse was more attuned to how modernity was leaving its indelible marks on Japanese women than any other director of classical Japanese cinema. For students of feminist film criticism, Russell’s book is an absolute must.”—David Desser, author ofEros Plus Massacre: An Introduction to the Japanese New Wave Cinema