Although not quite as famous as 1950s Japan's Golden Age of Cinema, movies from the Land of the Rising Sun in the 1930s were experiencing quite a bit of popularity in Asia. However, United States film fans were oblivious to the great works coming out of Japan until director Minoru Naruse's September 1935's "Wife! Be Like A Rose!" The now-Japanese classic finally was shown two years later in America after its initial release. An untimely New York Times' scathing review of the film put an end to its domestic showing, but other more aware critics acknowledged its innovative visuals were unique in filmmaking.
"Wife! Be Like A Rose!" has drawn parallels to films coming out of the French New Wave movement in the 1950s rather than belonging to the mid-1930s. Naruse's forte was heavily-focused on his female characters. Its plot centers around a daughter, Kimiko (Sachiko), about to get married. Her father had left the family 15 years earlier and remarried a geisha woman in the countryside. Kimiko hopes to get her father to walk her down the aisle at her wedding, but her finance's father insists he meets him before he does. Kimiko's troubles are compounded by a depressed mother who pines for her ex-husband and writes sad poems all day.
The character Kimiko can easily be placed in today's world. Director Naruse's "sprightly, modern feel" reflects Kimiko's progressiveness as a departure from her mother's traditionalistic behavior in marriage. "What makes this film so fascinating is the sheer level of characterization that goes into so many of the onscreen personalities," notes film reviewer Miles Imhoff. "Wife! Be Like A Rose!" was the winner of the 1936 Kinema Junpo Award for Best Film of the Year-equivalent to the Academy Awards Best Picture. Although Naruse was recognized as one of Japan's most influential directors at the time, his studio, Toho, besides "Wife! Be Lake A Rose!" had a habit of giving him weak scripts. He felt his superior filmmaking techniques were required to overcome the bad plots as well as the bad acting from the studio's contracted actors. After World War Two Naruse was a member of a select group of directors responsible for the resurgence of Japanese 1950s films in its golden age of film.
