Sister of The Gion and Japanese Women in the Prewar Period.
Sisters of the Gion of Mizoguchi Kenji (1898-1956) illustrates a bold view of prewar Japan society (1920s-1930s): old complicated problems in social and economical areas. In which, political democratization was vastly required, and later rapidly developed in order to compete with the Western world. The challenge of new Japan social forces of labor unions and women's suffrage is one of the leads of the Japan political democratization development. Sisters of the Gion layouts a chaotic and disoriented Japanese society with many problems needed to resolve in the late 1920s and the early 1930s. One is the brutal and unfair treatment of Japan society on women at the time. Others are the impacts of modern Western life style on Japanese middle class, and poor destiny of small businesses.
The movie starts with a public auction, to a short conversation of Furusawa and his assistant, finally to the image of Furusawa's wife packing and yelling, and Furusawa angrily left. The sequence of these scenes creates a chaotic and disoriented portrait of love, duty, and opportunity of a middle class Japanese merchant. It also implies certain complications that imposed on a Japanese merchant's life at the prewar time. According to Sheldon Garon, Japanese government in the late 18th century favored less on small businesses with the business tax of 1896; this pushed many small merchants into their ends. Disturbance in individual lives also means disturbance in their relationships and the society. As the Western influences merged into Japan, these middle class merchants gather into small-business associations to repeal the business tax of 1896. As a result, this social movement is the most successful.
Beside the repeal of the business tax of 1896, the women right is also critical in the prewar period. Again, the Western influence gives women a higher educational opportunity.