Repast (film)

Repast (めし) is a 1951 Japanese drama and shōshimin-eiga film directed by Mikio Naruse and starring Setsuko Hara. It is based on the final and unfinished novel by Fumiko Hayashi, and was the first in a series of adaptations of her work by the director.

Plot
Michiyo has moved from Tokyo to settle down in Osaka with her salaryman husband, whom she married against her parents' wishes. A few years into the marriage, her husband treats her carelessly, and she is slowly worn down by domestic drudgery. The situation worsens when her pretty niece, fleeing from her parents' plans for an arranged marriage, comes to stay and the husband responds to her flirtatious behaviour. Dissatisfied with his efforts to improve their household life, she leaves with her niece for Tokyo to stay with her family for a while, but finally returns, resigning to marital conventions.

Cast

 * Ken Uehara as Hatsunosuke Okamoto
 * Setsuko Hara as Michiyo Okamoto
 * Yukiko Shimazaki as Satoko Okamoto
 * Yōko Sugi as Mitsuko Murata, Michiyo's sister-in-law
 * Akiko Kazami as Seiko Tomiyasu
 * Haruko Sugimura as Matsu Murata, Michiyo's mother
 * Ranko Hanai as Koyoshi Dohya
 * Hiroshi Nihon'yanagi as Kazuo Takenaka
 * Keiju Kobayashi as Shinzo Murata, Michiyo's brother
 * Akira Oizumi as Yoshitaro Taniguchi
 * Ichiro Shimizu as Hatsunosuke's colleague
 * Haruo Tanaka as Jihei Maruyama
 * Sō Yamamura as Ryuichiro Okamoto
 * Chieko Nakakita as Keiko Yamakita

Production
Repast was the first of a series of six films directed by Naruse based on works by Fumiko Hayashi, "a novelist whose pessimistic outlook matched his own" (Alexander Jacoby). It also marked a successful return for Naruse, whose films of the preceding 15 years were regarded as lesser works by critics. According to screenwriter Toshirō Ide, he and his co-writer Sumie Tanaka had wanted to finish the story with the couple's divorce, but this was vetoed by the studio in favour of a conclusion with, as contemporary critic Takao Toda put it, "mass appeal". As a result, Tanaka left the project prematurely.

Legacy
Repast was screened at the Museum of Modern Art in 1985 and at the Harvard Film Archive in 2005 as part of their retrospectives on Mikio Naruse.

Awards

 * Blue Ribbon Award for Best Film, Best Actress (Setsuko Hara), Best Supporting Actress (Haruko Sugimura) and Best Screenplay (Sumie Tanaka, for Repast, Boyhood and Wagaya wa tanoshi)
 * Mainichi Film Award for Best Film, Best Actress (Setsuko Hara), Best Director (Mikio Naruse), Best Cinematography (Masao Tamai) and Best Sound Recording (Masao Fujiyoshi)