{"id":30160,"date":"2026-05-19T17:37:52","date_gmt":"2026-05-19T16:37:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/?p=30160"},"modified":"2026-05-19T17:37:52","modified_gmt":"2026-05-19T16:37:52","slug":"a-review-of-kokuho-the-most-successful-japanese-film-ever","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/?p=30160","title":{"rendered":"A review of &#8220;Kokuho&#8221;, the most successful Japanese film ever"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Since the early 17th century, Japanese culture has featured a form of theatre known as\u00a0<em>kabuki<\/em> which mixes dramatic performance with traditional dance. Although the original version was performed by a female troupe, the art form soon developed into its present all-male form after women were banned from performing in\u00a0<em>kabuki<\/em>\u00a0theatre and the men who perform the female roles are known as\u00a0<em>onnagata<\/em>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8220;Kokuho&#8221; &#8211; literally translated as &#8216;national treasure&#8217; &#8211; is set in post-war Japan over a period of some 50 years and centres on the initial friendship and subsequent rivalry between Kikuo (played by Ryo Yoshizawa), the son of a\u00a0<em>yakuza<\/em>\u00a0crime boss who &#8211; unlikely as it seems &#8211; has a rare talent as a\u00a0<em>onnagata<\/em>, and Shunsuke (Ryusei Yokohama), the son of an acclaimed\u00a0<em>kabuki<\/em>\u00a0practitioner.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This is a long film (three hours) and Westerners (like me) will sometimes struggle to follow the plot, but it is a stunning piece of work: the colour and costumes plus the singing and dancing all contribute to a visual and aural treat. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">There is immense attention to the detail of the\u00a0<em>kabuki<\/em>\u00a0art form: the author of the novel on which the film is based, Shuichi Yoshida, spent an unprecedented three years working backstage of a theatre; lead actors Ryo Yoshizawa and Ryusei Yokohama trained for a year and a half in traditional\u00a0<em>kabuki<\/em>\u00a0dance and movement; and the film&#8217;s director engaged a professional\u00a0<em>kabuki<\/em>\u00a0actor as the official consultant and instructor for all the stage performance scenes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">On its release in 2025, &#8220;Kokuho&#8221; was so successful in its home country that it became the all-time highest-grossing Japanese live action film.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Since the early 17th century, Japanese culture has featured a form of theatre known as\u00a0kabuki which mixes dramatic performance with traditional dance. Although the original version was performed by a female troupe, the art form soon developed into its present all-male form after women were banned from performing in\u00a0kabuki\u00a0theatre and the men who perform the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30160","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cultural-issues"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30160","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=30160"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30160\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30161,"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30160\/revisions\/30161"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=30160"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=30160"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=30160"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}