The most straightforward, and yet most complex, entry in the Silent Ozu - Three Crime Dramas set from Criterion’s Eclipse imprint is 1933’s Dragnet Girl, a dual drama about families and relationships and the effect the criminal lifestyle has on the ties that bind.
Joji Oka (No Blood Relation [review])
heads the cast as the charismatic gangster Joji. Formerly a boxer, Joji stepped
out of the ring when he fell in love with Tokiko (Mizoguchi and Kinoshita
mainstay Kinuya Tanaka, who also appeared in Ozu’s Equinox
Flower [review]). Tokiko is a tough cookie in her own right, but she prefers a
more domestic crime partnership that doesn’t involve her man getting pummeled
on a regular basis. Though Joji has many would-be suitors, Tokiko chasea them
all off, thus making it all the more surprising when a nice, quiet girl sneaks
in and legit steals Joji’s heart.
Misako (Sumiko Mizukubo, Apart from You
[review]) summons the thug to a corner rendezvous to ask him to encourage her
little brother, Lefty (Hideo Mitsui), to return to school and give up trying to
be a boxer and a crook. He looks up to Joji and would listen. Joji is taken
with Misako’s purity and selflessness, and he starts spending his days in the music
store where she works, listening to classical records. It’s a far more refined
musical excursion than the rowdy nightclubs he usually attends with his gang.
To many, Joji is becoming soft. Never mind he’s the guy we saw beat up three
bruisers all on his own just a few days before. All it takes is one dame
wanting you to settle down...
As the drama ramps up, Dragnet Girl
crosses similar territory as Walk Cheerfully [review].
Misako’s positive presence inspires Joji to consider getting clean, and though
she initially goes to the record shop with a gun to confront Misako, Tokiko is
quickly smitten with her, as well. She thinks about ditching the bad-girl
lifestyle modeling herself after her rival. The only one who can’t seem to get
Misako’s message of peace is the one she wants to go straight, her little brother,
who resists even after his hero threatens him.
Moreso than Walk Cheerfully Ozu toys with
the notion of fate in Dragnet Girl. In the psychology of the
script, which was written by Tadao Ikeda, the scribe behind Walk
Cheerfully and The Only Son [review], working from
a story by Ozu himself (hiding behind the pseudonym James Maki), we move closer
to the inescapable doom of film noir. Neither Joji nor Tokiko find it easy to
make a clean break, and in part because they don’t think they deserve it. Tokiko
is offered an ideal marriage by her boss, but can’t see herself stepping into a
housewife’s shoes; likewise, Joji must reject Misako in order to “get over
her.” When it comes down to it, the only thing that this Japanese Bonnie and
Clyde can count on is each other. Whatever their path to get to true love, at
least they found it together, and they can get out of it together, too. Embracing
a crime trope, Ozu positions them to pull one last heist with the intention of
snatching some seed money and getting out of town. It’s a pretty ballsy
robbery, with Tokiko leading the charge, and an even more hairy escape when the
cops come knocking. Yet, Ozu avoids the expected final shootout, seeking a
different solution for his lovers. Punishment offers redemption.
Dragnet Girl actually makes a pretty
convincing case for sucking it up and taking your lumps. It doesn’t hurt that
the impassioned argument for toughing it out is made by Tokiko. Kinuyo Tanaka
has a solid screen presence, and her confident delivery, and the complex
emotional swings that get her there, makes for the most convincing acting in
the movie. As perfect and angelic as Sumiko Mizukubo is as Kazuko, Tanaka
brings her character down to earth, so that she is both sympathetic and
relatable. She’s really the only choice for the confused Joji, who frankly
comes off as kind of weak-willed and not nearly as tough as he’s intended to
be.
But then, Ozu’s women generally have been the ones who have had to carry the heaviest burdens, and who do so with a quiet strength unique to them. In that, Dragnet Girl is part of a long tradition of the filmmaker, even as he would soon leave its genre trappings behind.
But then, Ozu’s women generally have been the ones who have had to carry the heaviest burdens, and who do so with a quiet strength unique to them. In that, Dragnet Girl is part of a long tradition of the filmmaker, even as he would soon leave its genre trappings behind.
Other selections from the Eclipse boxed set Silent Ozu - Three Crime Dramas are reviewed here: That Night's Wife.
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