An Inn At Osaka

Heinosuke Gosho was a prolific director who made at least 100 films, including the first "talkie." However, he is not well-know in the west. I was intrigued to see that Arthur Noletti Jr. has written an English language book-length study on Gosha, The Cinema of Heinosuke Gosha: Laughter Through Tears. Until recently I was not able to find any of his films with English subtitles, but recently I came across some of them and the first one I saw was An Inn At Osaka (1958). The story centers around the life of Koichi Mita (Shoichi Sano), an honest insurance man who gets demoted by his boss and sent to Osaka. He moves into an inn suggested by a man he meets in a restaurant-it turns out he works there and his sister owns the inn. The story basically follows the trials and tribulations of the these people, the three maids that work there and other guests. One of the maids, Oyone is played by Sachiko Hidari who would go onto star in Shohei Imamura's The Insect Woman. Essentially, all of them are facing financial difficulties and are struggling to get by and must laugh at their won struggles to endure them. The location shots of Osaka near the river offer a fascinating look at the city before the economic miracle. The dialogue in the film is peppered with Kansai ben (the local dialect) and has impressive cinematography throughout the film. I'm eager to see more and see if Gosha's films are all of this quality, which seems unlikely since he made more than 100, but I suspect more than a few gems.

Comments

[Ted T]

This is a very good one...

[Patrick]

Agreed, have you seen others?

[Ted T]

I watched what I could find online

[Ted T]

A bunch here:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCp-m002QzITUjPtHbrmy3pQ/search?query=gosho

[Patrick]

Since this, I have seen Where Chimneys Are Seen and will eventually get to the rest of these. I've recently come across a few Naruse that I haven't seen as well and been alternating between the two directors.