SOAS Research Online

Abstract

For Japan's oldest film studio Nikkatsu, the late-'50s and early-'60s represented a rapidly evolving, cosmopolitan playground in which Eastern and Western influences could be collided together in an explosive mix that ultimately resulted in movies that felt quite apart from either. These were the mukokuseki eiga (borderless or of no nationality), typified by Nikkatsu's nine-part wataridori (wanderer) series produced from 1959-1962. The first film in the series, The Rambling Guitarist ( Gitaa o motta wataridori), stands as a prime candidate through which to better understand the precise appeal of these films as well as the way their settings and characters captured a new, worldly aesthetic. Through a close analysis of The Rambling Guitarist, and more specifically, the way it presents and challenges various gender archetypes, this essay will look to present a snapshot of what Nikkatsu Action represented, straddling the borderline between two camps; East and West, old and new, tradition and modernity.