Some say Otsuta needs a man. What they really mean is that Otsuta needs
money.
Money, and how to get it, is the ongoing concern in Flowing, Mikio Naruse’s tale of down-and-out geishas in mid-century Tokyo. Otsuta’s geisha
dwelling, Tsuta House, is deep in debt, and it’s her fault: the result of her
love-affair with a man who took more than he gave. But Tsuta House still
survives, and that, too, is thanks to Otsuta (Isuzu Yamada), whose fame,
beauty, and mastery of traditional geisha arts continue to draw customers to
her business.
To those of us who have seen Yasujiro Ozu’s masterpieces (Tokyo Story being the most famous of them), the silent films he made early in his career can seem strange. Ironically, it’s their familiarity that makes them so. Ozu’s mature works are famously minimalist: conservative in style, slow and contemplative in pace, alike in subject matter. But much of his early work, influenced by Hollywood and his own studio masters, has a more populist feel. This was an artist in search of himself.
He did not find what he was looking for with Dragnet Girl, a gangster (!) film with characters more reminiscent of Mikio Naruse’s later work than Ozu’s. But though Dragnet Girl is an anomaly even among Ozu’s silent films—and far from the best of them—it is still interesting to watch. Especially when considering the roles Ozu assigned to both women and children later on.
