The fact that it is not meant to be exotic is what makes this film feel even more exotic.
What did the psychedelic scene look like to those in Japan in 1968?
1968年の日本でサイケデリック文化はどのようにとらわれていたのだろうか？
(Japanese explanation under the English.日本語解説が英語の下にあります！）
The photograph shows a Japanese Comedy-Jazz group going to an LSD party Haight-Ashbury in San Francisco in 1968. One of the guys lives in a dirty hippie pad with Jerry Garcia's poster on his wall. Policemen stop them on the street yelling "Hey, Japanese hippie". The main character's girlfriend is a painter, who idealizes hippie culture. They make a living by scamming people in front of art museums.
Yet this film isn't psychedelic at all!
The acting is a development from traditional Japanese theater such as Kabuki, Bunraku, and the Japanese traditional comedy Manzai. There is shamisen music played just as in traditional Bunraku theater. The singing is also based more on Japanese folk. So it leaves me with the impression "What is this?".
The fact that it is not meant to be exotic is what makes this film feel even more exotic. It feels as though people from a very far-away island somewhere suddenly started to dress up in psychedelic costumes, but since they only see what is on the surface, the actual play is very much a traditional Manzai performance and has nothing to do with psychedelic culture or the Grateful Dead.
I don't know what Japan was like in the 1960s. I was in NYC, and many people in the arts from Japan came to our apartment to study the psychedelic and experimental arts during this time. It probably was a very different place from Japan in the 1960s. Only the outward fashion, costumes, and some aspects of leftist ideology were similar.
The musician, Keiji Haino, often told me that he was envious that I got to see so many great bands when I was a child in NYC. In the late 1980s, I did some translation work for a CD company that distributed Grateful Dead's CDs. The owner of the company told me that Grateful Dead could only achieve sales of about 500 copies. The solo albums would be about 100 copies, but the drummer Micky hart's solo CD sales were 'tragic'. (I wondered if this meant 0 copies.)
In other words, psychedelic culture was never understood.
I, however, like this group.
This film is an interesting film because it shows them doing 'cosplay' (costume playing) of something that they didn't even understand, while, in fact, they were actually performing Manzai.
I once a live performance of this actor Tani Kei performing standard jazz with a big band orchestra. They were all good jazz musicians.
この写真はクレイジー・キャッツが1968年にサン・フランシスコのLSD パーティーに行くシーンだ。この映画の谷啓（たにけい）の住んでいる部屋にはグレートフル・デッドのジェリー・ガルシアのポスターが貼られている。サン・フランシスコの町で歩くと白人警察官に「Hey! Japanese Hippie!」ととめられる。植木等の相手役の浜美枝はヒッピー・シーンに憧れる絵描き。植木等と浜美枝は映画の初めではストリートで詐欺師をやって生活している。
しかし、この映画にはサイケデリックな要素がない。
役者たちの表現の仕方はむしろ日本の歌舞伎と漫才を思い起こさせる。音楽に浄瑠璃三味線が使われていて、その使い方も歌舞伎や文楽と同じである。日本の昔からの歌い方で「スーイスーイ」と歌ったり、『スーダラ節』など歌う。見ていて不思議な感じがする。エギゾティズムを狙っていないことが今僕が見るとよりエキゾチックに感じさせてしまう。どこか遠い国で1960年代のサイケデリックやLSDさえもを表面的なファッションにしか受け取れなかった人達がそのコスチュームをコスプレで着て、日本の伝統的な漫才か歌舞伎をやっているように見える。
あまりにも変わっていて、どう取られたら良いのだろうと思ってしまう。
僕は1960年代の日本は知らない。サイケデリック文化が普通に生活の中でも流行っていたニューヨークにいた。1970年代後半に会った灰野敬二は、日本の1960年代ではザ・ドァーズもグレートフル・デッドも一般的には手に入らなかった。探さなければいけなかったと僕に言った。だから僕がそういったバンドを生で見ていたことがうらやましかったと言っていた。1980年代の終わりごろにグレートフル・デッドのCDのディストリビュションを受け持っていた会社の人に会うと、グレートフル・デッドのCDの売れ行きは500枚位で、ソロだと100枚位。しかし、ミッキー・ハート（デッドのドラマー）のCDのセールスはもっと悲惨だ。（100枚よりもっと悲惨とはどういう意味だろう？0枚ということかな？）
この映画をこうした場面を見ていると非常に遠いカルチャーとして感じていたんだなと思ってしまう。
I came up with this film while I was searching the net for 10 films that impacted me, a project that I was invited to do by 野澤 美香 (Mica Nozawa). This film itself did NOT influence me, but I found it educational to learn about how the psychedelic scene looked like to those in Japan.
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