Seriously, The Most Beautiful is not in the mode of a particularly strident or aggressively anti-American or West saga, and I'm not even sure if America or the "Enemy" in sort of quotes are even mentioned once. In fact, the strength of the film is on Kurosawa's interest in the drama that would be found in the daily interactions of a factory like the one we see in this film, as the women are expected to reach a "Quota" in this emergency time of action. This expectation leads to what is actually more natural in such an environment: anxiety, stress, and, in what one could say is the most propagandistic aspect of the production, that work has to continue until morale improves! But hey, as Top Gun showed us, perhaps a team-spirited volleyball game is in order.
I think Kurosawa, whatever he had to do to appeal to the Studio/Governmental Powers That Be of the period, took the opportunity here to create a story that was not negatively drawn, as in we aren't seeing something that is meant to make people rush out and grab their guns or point fingers, rather it's about a collective (dare I say) positively drawn portrait of women who Can Do This (no don't insert that image of the woman with her bicep here).
It is simplistic when it comes down to it, and I would never claim this is a film that should be seen by non Kurosawa completionists (full disclosure, I came to this having only one or two of his works left to see), but I was pleasantly surprised that it is mildly engaging for the attention to performances and a kind of melancholy that the characters are fighting against. And yes, a lot of this comes down to "No, no, don't send me home because of X reason, I can keep working," and that drum is beat a number of times. And if you are wondering, there are at least half a dozen scenes of women breaking down in tears over what they may have done to (emotionally) slight a fellow co worker, and that is looked at in the film's pov as something that is like the gravest problem.
But I liked that Kurosawa depicts the issues for the characters as more interpersonal - or, I should really say in a larger sense, he let's these women like Noriko and Watanabe *be* human beings with some dimension despite the ultimate goal of this being to boost morale for the women watching at home. I could picture this as being without any personality and simply about beating the drum of "Do The Work For Your Country" and it isn't that. When a character gets sick, for example, this is looked at by the director as worthy of a sensitively drawn storyline, and it defines many of the people around this character as she struggles to try to get better - and then later when another character is sick more often than not and how this information becomes a focal point for another character.
This is all to say while Kurosawa can't help but get into repetition in the depiction of certain scenes - a group scene of laughing turning into a dramatic moment because a couple of girls are not laughing along happens at least three or four times here - he takes the scenes seriously as a dramatist, treats the emotional lives with sincerity (giving the actresses something to play, especially when one is shown as dead tired working on a project), and even crafts with his collaborators some kinetic camera movements and editing. It's a minor work that is marred by its sociological context, but an interesting one all the same.
I think Kurosawa, whatever he had to do to appeal to the Studio/Governmental Powers That Be of the period, took the opportunity here to create a story that was not negatively drawn, as in we aren't seeing something that is meant to make people rush out and grab their guns or point fingers, rather it's about a collective (dare I say) positively drawn portrait of women who Can Do This (no don't insert that image of the woman with her bicep here).
It is simplistic when it comes down to it, and I would never claim this is a film that should be seen by non Kurosawa completionists (full disclosure, I came to this having only one or two of his works left to see), but I was pleasantly surprised that it is mildly engaging for the attention to performances and a kind of melancholy that the characters are fighting against. And yes, a lot of this comes down to "No, no, don't send me home because of X reason, I can keep working," and that drum is beat a number of times. And if you are wondering, there are at least half a dozen scenes of women breaking down in tears over what they may have done to (emotionally) slight a fellow co worker, and that is looked at in the film's pov as something that is like the gravest problem.
But I liked that Kurosawa depicts the issues for the characters as more interpersonal - or, I should really say in a larger sense, he let's these women like Noriko and Watanabe *be* human beings with some dimension despite the ultimate goal of this being to boost morale for the women watching at home. I could picture this as being without any personality and simply about beating the drum of "Do The Work For Your Country" and it isn't that. When a character gets sick, for example, this is looked at by the director as worthy of a sensitively drawn storyline, and it defines many of the people around this character as she struggles to try to get better - and then later when another character is sick more often than not and how this information becomes a focal point for another character.
This is all to say while Kurosawa can't help but get into repetition in the depiction of certain scenes - a group scene of laughing turning into a dramatic moment because a couple of girls are not laughing along happens at least three or four times here - he takes the scenes seriously as a dramatist, treats the emotional lives with sincerity (giving the actresses something to play, especially when one is shown as dead tired working on a project), and even crafts with his collaborators some kinetic camera movements and editing. It's a minor work that is marred by its sociological context, but an interesting one all the same.