Seijun Suzuki - Early Life and Career

Early Life and Career

Suzuki was born during the Taishō period, and three months before the Great Kantō Earthquake, in the Nihonbashi Ward (now the Chūō Special Ward) in Tokyo. His younger brother, Kenji Suzuki (now a retired NHK television announcer), was born six years his junior. His family was in the textile trade. After earning a degree at a Tokyo Trade School in 1941, Suzuki applied to the college of the Ministry of Agriculture, but failed the entrance exam due to poor marks in chemistry and physics. A year later he successfully enrolled in a Hirosaki college.

In 1943, he was recruited by the Imperial Japanese Army during the national student mobilization to serve in World War II. Sent to East Abiko, Chiba, he was assigned the rank of Private Second Class. He was shipwrecked twice throughout his military service; first the cargo ship that was to take him to the front was destroyed by an American submarine and he fled to the Philippines. Later, the freighter that took him to Taiwan sank after an attack by the American air force, and he spent 7 or 8 hours in the ocean before being rescued. In 1946, having attained the rank of Second Lieutenant in the Meteorological Corps, he returned to Hirosaki and completed his studies. About his time in the military Suzuki wrote:

While I stayed in the army out of fear of being executed as a deserter as soon as I threw down my rifle and ran, it wasn't long before I was promoted to trainee officer with a salary of twelve-and-a-half yen, comparable at the time to that of a departmental manager in business life. I went to the Philippines, where the war took a wrong turn for us. Then I was transferred to Taiwan, where I was stationed at an isolated airport at the foot of a mountain, with twelve others. Our wages were divided into thirteen equal parts; as in a perfect communist system. To avoid the outbreak of a revolt because of sexual deprivation, we didn't just get food, clothing and shelter, but the army staff had also considered it strategically necessary to supply us with three army prostitutes. This isn't a very edifying story, but I can't help it: I spent most of my money on booze and women, and when I arrived at Tanabe harbor the year after liberation, I was completely destitute.

He has also said that he often found the horrors of war comical, such as men being hoisted on board his ship with ropes and being battered black and blue against the hull, or the bugler blasting his trumpet every time a coffin was thrown into the sea. Ian Buruma writes, "The humour of these situations might escape one who was not there. But Suzuki assures us that it was funny."

But war is very funny, you know! When you're in the middle of it, you can't help laughing. Of course it's different when you're facing the enemy. I was thrown into the sea during a bombing raid. As I was drifting, I got the giggles. When we were bombed, there were some people on the deck of the ship. That was a funny sight.

Next he applied to the prestigious University of Tokyo, but again failed the entrance exam. At the invitation of a friend, who had also failed the exam, Suzuki enrolled into the film department of the Kamakura Academy. In October 1948, he passed the Shochiku Company's entrance exam and was hired as an assistant director in the company's Ōfuna Studio. There he worked under directors Minora Shibuya, Yasushi Sasaki, Noboru Nakamura and Hideo Oniwa before joining the regular crew of Tsuruo Iwama.

I was a melancholy drunk, and before long I became known as a relatively worthless assistant director. At a large company such as Mitsui or Mitsubishi, these things would have led to my dismissal, especially in the old days, but as the studio as well as the assistant directors themselves were laboring under the strange misconception that they were brilliant artists, almost anything was tolerated, except arson, theft and murder. So I picked flowers for my wife during working hours, and when we were on location I stayed in the bus.