Jiraiya the Hero (S)

Fumiko Tsuneishi: "One of the very few surviving films featuring Matsunosuke Onoe (1875-1926), the first movie star in Japan, who starred in more than 1,000 films. It is based on the fantastic tale of Jiraiya, the hero of a ninja novel adapted from a famous Chinese story which was so popular that from 1839 onwards it was serialized for over 30 years, and then became a staple of kabuki theatre. Jiraiya had the ability to fly, to vanish, and to transform himself into a toad at will, and it wasn’t until his filmic incarnation that his character finally found the perfect medium for the visualization of his magic powers. Matsunosuke’s popularity was by this time firmly established, and the film’s success was due both to his superb performance and the innovative ideas of director Shozo Makino (1878-1929), known as 'the father of Japanese cinema'. This film marks the end of the very last phase of their collaboration." – The important and fascinating film was seen in a print of high contrast. It belongs to the cinema of wonders, transformations, apparitions, metamorphoses; a Japanese counterpart to the Méliès tradition.