FILM

A Traditional Tale

how the samurai story goes global

By Kimiko Shiro  

Old Master

The idea of the Samurai is a complex one. In many ways they represent a conservative Japanese nationalism, but, conversely, they also represent the promise of radical, revolutionary change. And it’s not just in Japan, but every time the Samurai figure appears, and remarkably they have appeared in many, many different cultures and in many, many different guises. Even now, new stories and movies are being made that explore the particular brand of conservative and revolutionary change that these figures have come to represent. The history of the Samurai is a tragic one. The once noble group of warriors who served in the name of the Emperor with status and admiration fell in standing during Japan’s Edo period from the fifteenth to the late nineteenth century. The Samurai Clans were forced to disband and became wandering mercenaries known as Ronin, masterless Samurai. Although historically the Samurai evolved with the nation for almost 700 years, the Samurai are always trapped between two competing ideals, that of the master and that of what is moral and good. It is this conflict that we see played out over and over again in non-japanese Samurai movies.

LE SAMOURAI

Yes, that’s the french article “le” in front of that samourai, but we’ll soon see that that’s not as strange as it might seem. Like most countries across the world, France was going through tremendous political and social change after World War II and we shouldn’t be surprised by a pop-cultural appearance of a Samurai to try and reconcile those conflicts. The director of Le Samourai, Jean Pierre-Melville had experienced a tremendous amount of societal upheaval in the twenty to thirty years prior to the movie’s production.

Melville was drafted into the French army in 1937, experienced the Nazi invasion in 1940 and joined the resistance for the rest of the war. By the time his film Le Samourai came out in 1967, France was in turmoil again: a fluctuating economy, the loss of the Algerian and Vietnam territories, and the stirring of what would become May 68, the left protests that gripped France for over a year. It’s not surprising, given what we know of the Samurai trope, that Melville would bring such a supposedly incongruous figure to France. The words le and samourai sound funny together, but somehow they make total sense given the situation.

Jef Costello, the protagonist of the story is a stoic and instinctual assassin who reflects the Bushido way of the samurai. This ancient belief says that following one’s master is the most honorable way to live. When his employer betrays him he is faced with the realization of his mortality as well as the mortality of others. His latest job is to kill a woman he met at a nightclub. In an odd way, Melville’s life has the basic plotline of a Samurai. He believes in the French system, the system breaks down, possibly to the point that he feels betrayed, and he takes revenge.

The film creates a situation where the viewer has to witness the brutality of Costello’s work as well as the honor of his actions. It’s difficult to figure out how we should feel. In a time of change, comfortable or not, we often don't know how to feel or act. Through films like Le Samourai, we can witness the change in the moral standards of individuals in the society they live in. More often than not, the change we see in Samurai-inspired stories comes with the death of the Samurai. In Le Samurai, rather than continuing to live the way Costello has as a cold-blooded assassin, he chooses to die on his own term and refuses to go through with the assassination. It follows the pattern of most samurai stories: the warrior is faced with the injustices of his master or society chooses a new form of honor and morality. In this way, the modern samurai challenges our conventional notions of heroism and the good.

GHOST DOG

Throughout the film Ghost Dog, the protagonist lives for the sake of Louis, a man who saved him many years ago. He remains loyal, following the Samurai code without faltering, obeying his every whim. Even when his “master” betrays him, Ghost Dog does not act for the sake of personal benefit or protection but dies for his own cause in serving his own version of authority. And although this may be seen as a noble act, we can read Ghost Dog’s actions and Jarmusch’s depiction of him in many different ways.

In the 1990s, America was going through a surge of shifting policies surrounding work. The first NAFTA agreement was in 1994 and ushered in the age of globalism in terms of the labor market and social unrest about what it meant. What’s clear is that we were at a strange moment in American history where the relationship between master/employer and samurai/worker was deeply at odds. Jarmusch picks up on this and turns a societal labor dispute into a Samurai story. The question is, is the samurai’s master totally and completely corrupt, which is what many workers felt about the U.S. government and NAFTA.

Though Ghost Dog lives and dies following his principles, his death follows the pattern of the samurai. unable to break away from the standard of serving his master, he dies for his master’s corruption. The parallels between mob culture and samurai culture represent the larger problems of a society in flux, the problem between those who make the rules and those who must follow them. Jarmusch presents a complex picture of the sacrifices necessary to surviving in a society. The capitalistic practice of using blood, sweat, and tears for the sake of another's profit is brutally obvious in his modern take on the Samurai story.

When the world feels unstable, the story of an unlikely hero who holds to a core set of values is comforting. We like to watch someone with power and skill, fight through a difficult situation. It is what makes the samurai story so engaging. But what are morality and justice in this scenario? Ghost Dog’s death is painful because he is a loyal follower, dedicated to the wishes of his master Louis. It reflects on a larger scale the many voices that have been squashed or silenced for the “peace” or survival of a so-called better global economy. Ghost Dog’s strength and stoic nature are a sign of hope, but the question is what do his values represent? Are they in the service of the community or not? It’s hard to tell.

KILL BILL

The late twentieth century was a peak time for feminism in the western world. People began to challenge all sorts of preconceived notions of what a woman could do and even what a woman was. The possibilities were endless and the movies caught those tensions. This is what makes Quentin Taratino’s Kill Bill so fascinating as he revels in new ideas about female power and authority.

The story of the female samurai is an uncommon one. Although there were female warriors known as Onna-Bugeisha, their stories were not commonly shared, for they defied the historical understanding of Japanese feminine qualities. In the west, it was basically the same with a few deviations, which is what makes Kill Bill, volumes 1 and 2 so interesting. Tarantino was 11 years old in 1974, which was a kind of watershed moment for feminism in the United States. As a movement, feminism began in the early ‘50s, but didn’t really reach its zenith until the ‘70s. Feminists growing disenchantment with the revolutionary spirit of the ‘60s, which promised freedom, but seemingly only for men, is what made it so potent. So, the ‘70s was an explosive cultural moment of growth and recognition. Growing up in this time of feminist change and energy, Tarantino would have grown to naturally feel the power of the feminist movement and unconsciously evoked it at another key moment of feminist upheaval in the 1990s. This helped inspire him to create the female action hero The Bride, played by Uma Thurman in his films Kill Bill, volumes 1 and 2.

There has always been a conflict between fighting and motherhood. Though this is not a necessary experience for all women, but Tarintino understands this. At the core of this crazy action film, Tarintino explores the unique blend of someone who can give life and take it away with great ease. Combining the qualities of a ruthless killer with the feeling of empathy and love, Tarintino investigates the conflict of contemporary feminism in the figure of the female samurai.

Throughout the film, there are nods to Samurai culture beyond her use of the katana. Bill’s employment of The Bride is much like the dynamic between the Master and the Samurai. Though The Bride begins to change once she realizes she is pregnant, she never really loses her fidelity to Bill. That’s the conflict of almost every samurai movie: master/servant. Adding pregnancy and abandonment twists the Samurai narrative. What once was a question of self-honor and strength now changes to include themes of love and protection. Similar to stories that focus on the honorable Samurai who serve the people who cannot help themselves, the film adds the theme of a mother’s dedication to her daughter. In a way, her child is her new Master, a master in which she finds a new purpose.

In the first scene of Kill Bill, The Bride is shot by Bill. It ruins her wedding rehearsal. When she fights her old coworker, attempted assassin, and Bill loyalist, Copperhead who just happens to have a seven-year-old daughter. The identity and emotions that come with being a mother are not just challenged by a job, but the whole profession. The risk of death and sacrifice for one's master is great, but for one’s own child it becomes even more powerful and complex. The opening fight between the Bride and Copperhead stops when Copperhead's daughter Nikki comes home from school. Her change in personality is jarring and tells you a lot of the tensions of motherhood and being an assassin.

At the end of the second movie, The Bride confronts Bill, her former master, her lover, the father of her daughter, and her enemy. The introduction of her daughter has The Bride flipping through multiple identities: mother, lover, and samurai. In the end, Tarintino gives us the mother Samurai. Motivated by love and protection, he explores themes of honor and morals similarly found in Kurosawa’s films. She represents the Samurai as honorable figures who work for the protection of those who cannot protect themselves which is kind of the definition of motherhood. So, the Kill Bill films are really an odd feminist track; it picks up on cultural tensions and resolves them in both radical and conservative ways.

Conclusion

There are many character tropes that have been used for centuries, noble knights, corrupt royalty, superheroes, etc. The tale of the Samurai had gained popularity in the last century to represent the moral complexities of humanity, reflecting ever-changing societal and cultural development. The ability to switch between narratives of honorable service and political change is an ongoing tension in the stories we tell.

©Kimiko Shiro and the CCA Arts Review