Harakiri

Once again it’s my turn to present at movie night, and for my first selection I went with a film that I found (to my minor surprise) was the highest-rated Japanese film on IMDB (minimum 5000 votes – and second-highest with minimum 50 votes) – and no, it’s not Seven Samurai, it’s not Ikiru, it’s not Kurosawa at all. Nor is it Ozu, nor is it Miyazaki.  It’s Masaki Kobayahsi‘s 1962 classic of the samurai genre, Harakiri.

The Japanese claustrophobic can find no relief even in death

The film is set in Edo (later: Tokyo) in 1630.  The current era is prosperous, and moreover peaceful, which is good for just about everybody except for the ronin – the unaffiliated samurai.  One of these ronin, Tsugumo Hanshirō goes to the estate of the Iyi clan, and attesting to an inability to support himself and a desire to die with honor, requests the usage of their courtyard for the ritual of seppuku (the more formal term for the somewhat vulgar “harakiri”).

The leadership of the Iyi clan attempts to discourage Hanshirō from this course of action.  It turns out that about a year before was the first instance of ronin requesting a place for seppuku.  Impressed by the man’s conviction and sense of honor, the clan to whom this ronin had gone offered him a full-time position in their household, but this once-sincere request has now sparked a series of disgraceful copycats hoping to also find employment, but most being given some alms and sent away.

Some help here?  I got a splinter!

In furtherance of their attempt to dissuade Hanshirō, they tell him the story of another ronin (originally from the same clan as Hanshirō) by the name of Chijiiwa Motome who appeared at their gates several months before with the same request.  In what they considered to be a nod to the samurai code of honor and at the same time hoping to prevent more copycats from scheming for a cash handout, three top advisers to the Iyi clan decide to force Motome to follow through with his request for seppuku.  Despite the fact that Motome asks for a two-day stay of his sentence, and despite the fact that Motome is so poor he has been forced to pawn his sword, Motome is made to disembowel himself with his own replacement bamboo sword – an excruciatingly painful and prolonged process.  Hirokuro, one of the advisers who pushed to force Motome’s suicide acts as his “second” – the man whose job it is to mercifully decapitate the samurai once he has begun the process of disemboweling himself – but will not perform his job until Motome struggles to complete the double, cross-shaped ritual cuts with the dull bamboo blade.

The seppuku artist sits upon his canvas

Hanshirō, however, is not there to bluff, and he intends to carry out the act.  But when the clan assigns his second, Hanshirō insists on being able to make his own choice.  The Iyi clan grants this request, and Hanshirō selects Hirokuro as his second.  Unfortuately, Hirokuro has called in sick that day, and as the clan attempts to persuade him to come in – and subsequently Hanshirō’s next choices, the other two advisers that pushed for Motome’s death, also coincidentally out sick – Hanshirō tells his tale.

No wonder he’s poor, his umbrellas don’t work!

Eleven years before, Hanshirō’s clan had been abolished by the Shōgun.  He held a position of honor in the clan, and expected to follow his lord in the ritual of seppuku.  However, before he could do so his close friend performed seppuku in his place, leaving him a note asking him to live on and raise his teenaged son…Motome.  Hanshirō is commanded to follow those wishes by his lord, and struggles to make his way in the world as a ronin, and eventually is reduced to being a struggling umbrella maker.  But Motome and Hanshirō’s daughter fall in love, get married, and bear Hanshirō a grandchild, leaving them a happy, if poor family.

Going camping is a lot less exciting when you sleep on a wood floor every day

Happy, that is, until the daughter and grandson both fall seriously ill.  Motome, in desperate straits to hire a doctor, and having already sold everything of value (including, unbeknownst to his father-in-law, his blades), goes secretly to the house of the Iyi clan in his disgraceful attempt to come up with some cash.  Hirokuro and the others return his body to Hanshirō’s house, being certain to point out both Motome’s shame, and his bamboo blades, and his unnecessarily painful death.  A short time later, both Hanshirō’s grandson and his daughter succumb to their disease, leaving him alone.

At this point, even the Iyi clan is pretty clear that Hanshirō’s true purpose is vengeance, not seppuku, but as they are about to dispatch him, he drops one last bomb on them.

Strike me down and I shall become balder than you can possibly imagine

You see, in the week before he came to the house of Iyi, Hanshirō had tracked down the three advisers who were responsible for Motome’s death and defeated each of them in battle.  But instead of killing them, he has done what is even more difficult – he has claimed their topknots, and pulls all three out of his kimono as proof.  This is a disgrace even worse than death, and he reveals to the Iyi clan that these three are not in fact ill, but instead are home in disgrace, hoping to find excuses to stay away until they can grow their topknots back and avoid their deserved shame and probable command of seppuku from their lord.

No one knows who they were, or what they were doing, but their legacy remains…

And then, with no story for Hanshirō left to tell, it’s time for the final samurai showdown.  Hanshirō is of course desperately outnumbered, but he manages to kill and wound several enemies.

Through eternity/I sit in my family shrine/Please bring me hair dye

He even makes his way to a throne room, where the Iyi clan reverence their ancestral armor.  He topples the armor before, having bested the Iyi samurai, finally being killed by three guards with guns, new but quite dishonorable weapons.  The Iyi clan force the disgraced adviser to perform seppuku, cover up the deaths of their men, and are presented with a commendation from the Shōgun for their excellence in following the Code of Bushido.  The end.

While it’s a slow and talky (read-y?) movie, this really is one of the great films of its genre without a doubt.  The entire film is a meditation on the concept of honor – what is more dishonorable, Motome’s actions, or those of the Clan of Iyi?  To us, and to Hanshirō, the answer is obvious.  Yet the dishonorable cover up their atrocities, and are honored in the end.  It’s not a new story, and it’s hard to call it a happy ending, but it’s a story that needs to be told again, and again, and again.  We haven’t learned it well enough yet.