American travelers who journey to Japan come back with funny stories of
an ancient culture vastly different to the Western eye. Hollywood and
Indies films have tried to capture the experience of being in Japan
numerous times at the movies. How close are any of these films to what
it is really like?
Marlon Brando starred in Sayonara (1957) about an air force pilot who
falls in love with a Japanese theater performer. Unfortunately I never
saw Sayonara, however Brando was in the Kansai area so he did experience
Japan first-hand as a traveler. Since Brando was a movie star he didn’t
receive the average-person-going-to-Japan treatment. He was probably
well taken care of and avoided some of the culture shock.
The first movie I remember seeing about being in Japan was in 1986
starring Michael Keaton as Hunt Stevenson in Gung Ho. Directed by Ron
Howard, Gung Ho is about All-American Hunt Stevenson who tries to save
the town of Hadleyville, PA as a Japanese company buys the auto plant
that he manages. Cultural misunderstandings ensure as Japanese bosses
bring unique Japanese business culture to Hadleyville.
During the opening sequence, Hunt travels to Japan to meet with Assan
Motors. Here is where real Japan is only glimpsed. You see Keaton
stumbling around his surroundings as he gets lost in Tokyo and ends up
talking to a farmer in a rice field that he can’t understand. He
babbles in English to a confused farmer. That does happen in Japan. I
can remember my first time walking from Makino train station trying to
find Kansai Gaidai University and winding up in a rice field talking to
a farmer who had no idea what I was saying. Finally we both gave up
trying to communicate and I shuffled off.
You also see Michael Keaton looking at all the weird plastic food models
inside restaurant windows and he makes a grimace with his face as he
sees a raw egg with seaweed over rice. The next scene shows Keaton
eating an Egg McMuffin walking out of McDonald’s. That also really
happens in Japan. I remember making a foolish vow to only eat Japanese
food while in Japan. Two weeks later I was munching on a Big Mac. It
just happens to you.
The best scene in Gung Ho is seeing Keaton’s future Japanese boss
getting yelled at for poor performance. Keaton wanders in and asks the
man doing the screaming the most gaijin question of all, “Is this Assan
Motors? 'Cause I am really lost.”
The lost traveler is such a common occurrence in Japan that you take it for granted
and expect to get asked directions. Some travelers get irate and shout, others
stumble angrily along without asking, and then there are those who have it together
and happily accept being lost. The later group has the best time being in Japan.
You have to make the best of it, no matter what.
The rest of Gung Ho was just a standard '80’s comedy about Japanese
bosses and doing company exercises and the two different nationalities
not getting along at work. I thought Gung Ho fell apart just after the
beginning.
The next movie, and the one that did the best job presenting Japan to
the West, was Mr. Baseball (1992) that starred Tom Selleck as Jack
Elliot, an aging Baseball player whose poor performance causes him to
get traded to a Japanese baseball team. Elliot travels to Nagoya to
begin training. There are a lot of incidents in the movie that are
real.
In the opening, the Japanese interpreter assigned to Jack tells him that there are
places to go and people to see and Jack says, “arriving drunk and tired.” That is
indeed accurate after an 18-hour flight. I was once on a flight that took 24 hours
exactly, including layover time, and I didn’t get much sleep at all.
Still at the airport, the Japanese press asks Jack Elliot, “What do you think of
Japan?”
Jack says, “there are a lot of short people walking very fast.”
In Japan, Americans have a bad reputation for being sarcastic at the expense of
others and this doesn’t go over well with the Japanese. It is just this type of
sarcasm that causes some films to do so poorly in Japan (like 2003's Lost in Translation, which I'll get to in a minute).
There are several scenes with Jack losing his temper, which is the worst thing a
traveler in Japan can do. Finally he learns to control his anger and he matures
enough to get along.
When you travel to Japan, everyone goes through different stages of culture shock
from How Great It Is To Be Here, in the beginning, to Get Me the Hell Out of Here,
at the end. Mr. Baseball shows each stage of culture shock and how Jack Elliot
reacts and copes.
The worst film for the traveling experience is Lost in Translation. Bill Murray
starts out OK by accepting criticism from a typical Japanese director then he ends
up getting rude and sarcastic to a Sushi chef. This paints a bad example of
Westerners and it is no surprise that Lost in Translation didn’t do well at all.
Murray plays an aging actor who is typical of some American travelers who go to
Japan, get bored by not venturing out to see the country, and confine themselves to
the hotel and the hotel bar getting drunk. That is like saying, “I’m here in Japan
but I don’t want to go out and do anything.”
Tarantino did a better job as The Bride, Uma Thurman, travels to Okinawa to meet
sword smith and Sushi chef, Hattori Hanzo in Kill Bill (2003.) In Kill Bill, the
exchange between Sonny Chiba as Hattori Hanzo and The Bride is very real. The chef
asking what words do you know in Japanese and Uma saying a few basic words. This is
met with the usual, “You say arigato just like a Japanese.” While not true at all,
this is the Japanese person’s way to encourage Westerners to keep studying.
These are just a few examples of travels to Japan on film. Some are forgotten and
will become lost over time but some are actually entertaining and accurate with
respect to the Japanese. The best example is still Mr. Baseball. Spring is almost
here and Baseball season will start up soon. It is the perfect time to watch Mr.
Baseball on DVD.
With that, sayonara.
"The Asian Aperture" is ©2010 by Jason Fetters. Webpage design and all graphics herein (except where otherwise noted) are creations of Nolan B. Canova. All contents of Nolan's Pop Culture Review are ©2010 by Nolan B. Canova.
