Arnold Fanck's   Die Tochter des Samurai

Die Tochter des Samurai  –  The Daughter of the Samurai

 The 1937 film Die Tochter des Samurai  (The Daughter of the Samurai) was written, produced and directed by famed silent and sound film pioneer and director, Dr. Arnold Fanck. It was the very first (and only) co–production between Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan. The film received good reviews and was well–acted by a fine cast.  Top Japanese actors  were cast– such as Sessue Hayakawa – who became prominent after WWII and to most English-speaking film–goers would be remembered as Colonel Saito in The Bridge on the River Kwai.  The Japanese female lead was played by the young Setsuko Hara, best known perhaps to Westerners for her lead in Tokyo Story decades later. But Fanck, apparently not altogether happy with the reception of the film, self–published his own 118 page glossy book (shown below) in March, 1938. His title of the book was The Daughter of the Samurai – A Film in the Echo of the German Press.

Announcement in the film studio publication TERRA ILLUSTIERTE - Nr. 3 / of 17.3.1937 :

BELOW: The film's  German title was originally announced not as  The Daughter of the Samurai, but  rather as   Brave Little Mitsuko:

Dr. Fanck addressed the Japanese Motion Picture Foundation  (Dai Nippon Eiga Kyokai) at the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo on October 31, 1936 on the topic "On the exportation of Japanese Motion Picture Films" and his comments included the following:

Is it really possible in Japan to make a picture which can be understood in Europe and America? Until a few months ago, I thought it may probably be impossible to make one, as I was then trying to make an export film myself, but now I have completed my first trial production of a picture, I would like to answer "Yes". Yes, it is possible to make a splendid export film in Japan, which can be understood in foreign countries.

Furthermore, it is possible to make Japanese export motion picture film reach the height of technics such as rightly claimed in foreign countries by technical method that can be used in Japan at present. The way is not easy, of course, but as long as I have an experience the way will become easy. Now, before I enter into a question of export film, I should like to restrict the extent of my remarks principally to the play film. I will not touch upon the so-called cultural film, namely the additional film of 200 to 300 metres long and takes only ten minutes to screen it. It is obvious that a good cultural film is important in any country, but it is nothing compared with the significance of the play film.....

Note: We assume that this speech was delivered in German and that Dr. Fanck used the term Spielfilm meaning feature film, but an incorrect translation would be 'play film' as the verb 'to play' in German is spielen. He obviously means feature films in contrast to short films/cultural films.

BELOW, Arnold Fanck and Setsuko Hara at the time of the film's German premiere.

The film's  plot, as summarised by Wikipedia:  

Yamato Teruo (Isamu Kosugi) returns to Japan after spending six years at an agricultural college in Germany. Teruo is the adopted son of an old samurai family, and is expected to marry the eldest daughter, Mitsuko (Setsuko Hara). However, Teruo has become infected with the idea of Western individualism during his stay in Europe, and refuses to bow to the demands of society. Instead, he confounds his future father-in-law Yamato Iwao (Sessue Hayakawa) by announcing that he intends to marry a German journalist, Gerda Storm (Ruth Eweler), whom he met on the ship back to Japan. Gerda, however, is a blond, chaste, Aryan woman, and will not agree to a mixed-race relationship. She attempts to convince him of his duty to the Japanese race and traditions and to reconcile him with his family.

Meanwhile, Mitsuko, feeling dishonored by Teruo's rejection, attempts to commit suicide by throwing herself into a volcano. She is rescued at the last second by Teruo, and the couple is romantically reunited. Sometime later, the young couple and their baby are now living in Manchukuo, the "New Earth", working on a farm under the benevolent gaze of a vigilant soldier guarding against the ever-present threat of Bolshevism.

Our Collection contains:

• The original German film poster

• The German Werberatschlag (Cinema owner’s promotion guide -- missing some pages of dot matrix advertising and one text page.) -shown below 

• The Gauflmstelle handbill advertising the film

• A second advertising brochure from Terra Filmkunst -shown below

• A small number of lobby cards and press photographs

• Arnold Fanck’s self-published 1938 book Die Tochter des Samurai – Ein Film in Echo der Deutschen Presse, Berlin

• Cinema Year Book of Japan 1936–1937, Tokyo, with Fanck’s speech to the Japan Motion Picture Foundation on October 31,1936 at the Imperial Hotel, Tokyo, published in English; with additional contents relating to the film.

•  The Illustrierter Film–Kurier cinema programme

• The Das Programm von Heute cinema programme

Below, pages from the ultra-rare cinema owner's promotion guide (Werberatschlag). Our copy is incomplete and missing most of the perforated tear-out pages of dot matrix graphic designs meant for use by the cinema owners to place adverts in their local newspapers. We scanned here all existing pages:

In our Poster Gallery we show one of the two original posters for this film, which could be the only existing original poster sheet in any collection worldwide.  The poster shown at left below is the one we own:

 Our poster can be found here.

Below our 59 centimeter (23 1/3 inch) long advertising "dodger" with the printed censorship seal of the Reischsfilmprüfstelle/RFK for distribution in the Reich:

The photo  below, which appeared in the Film-Kurier Tageszeiutng, front page,  of 27. März 1941, shows the Marmorhaus Cinema in Berln decked out for the film's world premiere with the Japanese flag and Kanji lettering and advertising for the film , which was attended by the Imperial Japanese Foreign Minister Yosuke Maisuoka.