Yoshiwara

Michiko Tanaka's family sells her to a geisha house in Yoshiwara, Tokyo's red-light district. She is carried to her place of business by rickshaw man Sessue Hayakawa, who falls in love with her and tries to buy her freedom, to no avail; she doesn't begin to have enough money. Noble, virtuous Russian naval officer Pierre Richard-Willm finds her while rebuking a fellow officer who went thither for a good time. They fall in love, and he pays the owner of the house money for all her time while he's been assigned to Tokyo for the purposes of the plot. Meanwhile, Hayakawa is let out of prison if he spies constantly on Willm.

It should come as no surprise to begin by noting that Max Ophüls' movie is an exercise in formalism, a stage play with fine camerawork by Eugen Schüfftan. The story it is based on is derivative junk, written by someone who apparently had seen MADAME BUTTERFLY, and perhaps Miss Tanaka in her stage premiere in DIE GEISHA. Willm is a good actor and performs his role with conviction, even though what is important to him varies from minute to minute. Hayakawa acts superbly in a largely physical role -- the producers thought he spoke French and cut his dialogue on discovering he did not.

Miss Tanaka performs her role well. She was actually an opera singer, and had performed in Puccini's opera. She was the niece of the Japanese Ambassador to Vienna, and had moved thither to study violin and singing. There she married the wealthy owner of a chain store, and began a career that lasted many years. She died in 1988, aged 74.