The history of Japanese animation is studded with politically committed products. From the very first productions of this kind such as Strength, Women, And the Ways of The World, made by Masaoka Kenzo in the 1930s, to the present day. One only must think of the ecocritical and pacifist flair that emerges from many of Hayao Miyazaki’s works or of very recent feature films that touch on socially relevant issues such as Naoko Yamada’s A silence voice or Lonely Castle in the Mirror directed by Keiichi Hara.
Released in Japanese cinemas in 2021, Masaaki Yuasa’s Inu-Oh is a political manifesto focusing on the themes of intersectionality, identity, and social struggle. Irreverent, visionary, and unique, the feature film is set in 14th century Kyoto in the Muromachi period. Here, the story of the Heike, a clan massacred by the Genji clan, fell into oblivion as it was repressed by the victors. They colonised the official historical imagination, imposing a single version of the facts and making any reference to the existence of the Heike disappear from public narratives. Into this frame come the two outsiders whose task it is to bring these forbidden tales to the surface. In doing so, they will both begin a journey of self-determination and rebellion against the established order.
What about the two protagonists? The first Tomona is a monk who plays the biwa (typical short-handled lute). After losing his father following the discovery of a mysterious artefact Heike becomes blind and once grown up seeks the truth about this fate from the shogunate. Inu-Oh is a semi-demonic creature deformed from birth. Scorned by his father and a practitioner of Sarugaku theatre, he is forced to hide his face behind a mask.
One of the most important political messages of the film emerges from the very first meeting of the two characters. As they get to know each other, they seem almost immune to the prejudice, fears and stereotypical labels to which out-of-the-ordinary people are often subjected in societies.
The fact that Tomona, being blind, is in no way conditioned or frightened by Inu-Oh’s deformity is an invitation to individuals of all ages to push their visual angle beyond appearances and what certain diffuse and heteronomous. perspectives want us to see. For his part, Inu-Oh appears to be fascinated by the bonzo’s blindness and rebellious genius, and propelled by the driving rhythm of his music, discovers he has a talent for dancing.
From this moment on, what comes into play is the willingness of the two artists to appear together in a human and artistic partnership that brings them closer precisely by virtue of their status as persons belonging to minorities, leading precarious lives. Theirs can be seen as an alliance of bodies, where bodily acts become a performative fact. Let us see how.
Breaking gender boundaries in ancient Japan
Today, more and more children and adolescents claim to place themselves outside of sexual identities assigned at birth or gender expressions given to them by society. In 2019, the New York Times noted how Generation Z youth preferred to choose their own words with which to describe themselves, rejecting pre-packaged labels.
Those who define themselves as gender fluid give rise to a way of being, of appearing, of feeling, that ranges across a broad spectrum of identity configurations: male, female, neutral and non-binary.
The view that gender fluidity is a typical feature of contemporary life is widespread, but in fact in Indian, Native American and Aboriginal cultures it has existed for centuries.
This way of choosing gender freely in one’s biographical journey can be found in the physical and moral transformation of Tomona and Inu-Oh in mediaeval Japan. In the course of the events, both performers will undergo a bodily, musical, spiritual metamorphosis, which will involve their popular audience and beyond in an ecstatic, rocking delirium.
Inu-Oh will revolutionise both himself and the discipline of Sarugaku, overshadowing other practitioners and his father’s theatre company itself in the eyes of society. Performance after performance, together with Tomona (who will take on the name Tomoari) they will break down all barriers to the free manifestation of transgender and/or gender fluid traits. Both adopt a look that is a hybridisation of traditional Japanese clothing and clothes or accessories in the style known as glam rock, in vogue in the 1970s and 1980s in America and Europe. The two wear their hair long and in many scenes wear flashy make-up. Inu-Oh in his movements and appearance is reminiscent of very famous vocalists such as Bowie, Freddy Mercury, Marc Bolan, Peter Gabriel; he looks, at times, like a character from Velvet Goldmine (1998). It is no coincidence that his voice was dubbed by Avu-chan, famous genderqueer frontman of the Japanese rock band Queen Bee.
Tomoari, with a very androgynous look, traces the style of great icons such as Zeppelin, Kiss, The Who, Iggy Pop. By mixing flamboyant and typically feminine elements with transgressive clothing and offbeat combinations, the biwa player voluntarily feminises masculinity, as so many performers did between the 1950s and 1980s. Among other things, the relationship between the two protagonists hints in a very veiled way at going beyond mere artistic communion.
The viewer has the arduous task of exploring, from an intersectional perspective, how various lines of identity intersect as they emerge in the referential content of the feature film by looking at intertextual references, messages, styles, genre characteristics.
Breaking traditions with art: a decolonising rebellion
In order to fully understand Inu-Oh, one has to get to the heart of the message Yuasa wants to send out: learning about what lies behind the transformations that go through man and the world is the key to getting closer to understanding what freedom is.
In Inu-Oh, the expressive power of music transports man beyond a reality colonised by the hegemonic historical powers.
Through rock opera present, past and future dialogue with each other, placing the diversity of men and the political ideals of an era in a dialectical relationship. Music, politics, the arts and Kyoto itself are transformed by the rebellion in music of our heroes in a surreal fusion of traditionalism, folklore and modernity.
For instance, in Inu-Oh’s performance set to the notes of Burial Mound of Arms, in recounting the fate of the Heike in the battle of Dan-no-ura. Many choreographic elements are reminiscent of Michael Jackson’s Thriller video clip. This is both in terms of the dance steps, and choreographically at the level of the stage architecture, where arms of the Heike like zombie limbs punctuate the rhythm of the theatrical narrative.
As Inu-Oh goes on with his performances, his body begins to become human, breaking the curse he had fallen victim to due to his father’s lust for power. Why does this happen? It happens because Inu-Oh brings back the repressed stories of the Heike. He returns them to the Japanese people and thus allows the spirits of the clan to reach nirvana. He changes himself and at the same time the world in which he lives.
The same goes for Tomona. He is tasked with narrating the exploits of Inu-Oh, a Japanese aoidos, who recounts the exploits of an epic hero of the Rising Sun. As he transgresses the musical and costume rules approved by the shogunate, he arrives at the truth about the patricide that occurred in his past.
We leave it to our readers to discover the ending, we conclude with the words used on Wired who called Yuasa’s work “the most beautiful animated rock concert (of the 1300s)” and with those of William Bibbiani who, as explained in the official trailer on TheWrap described it as “the best feudal-Japanese-hair-metal-demonic-curse- serial-killer- political-tragedy-rock-opera of the year”.
