Really Authentic? Japanese Reaction to Shogun

Shogun’s samurais: Authentic or Hollywood fiction?

Have you already watched Shogun? As most of you already know, it’s a very popular TV series about the samurai era on Disney Plus. As a Japanese, I’m proud that it won 18 Golden Globe awards, which was a record high. Of course, it’s becoming popular in Japan as well, and many people are analyzing and expressing why it was such a big hit. As far as I’ve read over some analyses, the majority opinions say that the great thing about Shogun is its authenticity and reality. Indeed, in most of the Hollywood movies so far, Japanese samurais don’t look Japanese to us Japanese people mainly due to their behavior.

Thinking rationally, it’s funny because we, present-day Japanese people, have never seen real samurais. Nevertheless, the reason why we have a stereotypical and common image of samurais is because we have watched a lot of samurai-themed TV shows. For your information, Hiroyuki Sanada, the actor playing the lead role of Shogun is a master of swordplay from the Japanese action movie industry. In this sense, it’s no doubt that Shogun is high in authenticity and reality. However, as I wrote above, such common sense might be a fiction created by the entertainment industry. Today, let’s see how much we still have a cultural continuity from around 1600, the period which Shogun is set in.

As the people who have watched Shogun probably notice it, the inside of buildings was depicted so dark. Of course, it’s very natural because the lighting equipment at that time was only vegetable-oil candles, even darker than the current candles. Probably, this backdrop created a culture to enjoy and appreciate shadow inside the house in Japan. The Japanese people of former days found beauty in a dimly lit space. A good example is shoji (paper sliding doors). It was developed and widely used to prevent direct sunlight from entering the house. Considering this, I think the following backstage story of Shogun makes sense. The film crews said the interior of the film set was so beautiful when it was shot from inside with the background for the landscaping of a garden, but not so much when shot from outside (probably because it’s too dark, I guess).

If there’s a cultural continuity in the design of furniture, our products may look more beautiful when they are placed and seen in a dimly lit space, together with the background for natural landscaping. Please give it a try when you get one!