Word: kesa
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Amid the chanting of sutras, the sounding of gongs and the curling smoke of burning incense. Chief Abbot Oda Sesso was ordaining a head priest for the Zen Buddhist temple of Daitokuji Ryosen-An in Kyoto, Japan. The new Zen priest gravely accepted the kesa -the richly brocaded red-and-gold silk scarf that is the mark of the priesthood -and assumed the Buddhist name of Jyokei. But in Chicago, where she was born 65 years ago, her name was Ruth Fuller. Last week she became the first American in history to be admitted to the Japanese Buddhist priesthood...
Based on an ancient legend, the plot explores a soldier's attempt to win love in the same way he won honor; by force. The warrior, a brave but bestial knight named Moritoh, is struck with an insane desire for a noblewomen, Lady Kesa. Finding that she is already married, he can only answer her love for her husband with threats of bloodshed. The final victory of love over violence is inevitably tragic...
...full of blood and thunder but empty of any artistic value, is never exploited deeply for purely emotional impact. Much of the film's restraint springs from the acting of Kazuo Hasegawa as Moritoh and Machiko Kyo, already known to American audiences for her part in Rashomon, as Lady Kesa. They are content merely to suggest love by the slow movement of a hand, and desire by a grimace that lasts only for second. Where a Western actor would shriek, they merely tremble...
Emboldened by this great discovery, Kesa revolted against the secretary: he wanted his money, he wanted to get off the veranda, and he wanted to play a part in Parliament. But the secretary merely cut off Kesa's food allowance, and left him to fend for himself, hungry, broke and unable to speak to anyone in the great, strange town. That was why Kesa, the brave hunter, had wept...
Moved by the story, his colleagues took charge of Kesa. They got some of his money back, but the secretary fled. So they got Kesa a ticket back home to Bastar and promised him protection-and another secretary-for the next session. Meanwhile, last week, Representative Kesa was happy among his constituents and his 14 wives, with plenty of time to exercise his long neglected bow & arrow...