The Agony of Eldercare: Two Japanese Women Directors Study an Age-Old Problem

Alzheimer’s Disease and senile dementia have become household
words East and West in recent years. Cinema’s close ties with
contemporary life should make it the ideal venue for depicting this
social phenomenon. In Japan, two women directors in particular
responded to the problem of an aging population with thought-provoking
studies of the problems of eldercare and dementia, Haneda Sumiko (b.
1929) and Matsui Hisako (b. 1946).

Haneda’s The
World of the Senile (1984) and Matsui’s Oriume (2002) stand
out as the most dynamic explorations to date of old age in crisis. Both
skillfully conjoin the pity and the horror of the victim’s
plight with the equally troubling and complex consequences for the
family.

Questions to be addressed in this lecture include: What is the salient
feature of each director’s treatment? How does each resolve
the ageless moral issue of filial obligation (giri) in conflict
with personal inclination (ninjō)?
How do you account for each director’s mode of
representation? And how does she generate the desired audience
response?

Keiko McDonald is Professor of Japanese Cinema and Literature at the
University of Pittsburgh. Her publications include Cinema East: A Critical Study of
Major Japanese Films (1983), Mizoguchi (1984), Japanese Classical Theatre in
Film (1994), From
Book to Screen: Modern Japanese Literature in Films (1999)
and Reading a Japanese
Film: Cinema in Context (2006).