In this revealing study, Daisuke Miyao explores "the aesthetics of shadow" in Japanese cinema in the first half of the twentieth century.

In this revealing study, Daisuke Miyao explores "the aesthetics of shadow" in Japanese cinema in the first half of the twentieth century. This term, coined by the production designer Yoshino Nobutaka, refers to the perception that shadows add depth and mystery. Miyao analyzes how this notion became naturalized as the representation of beauty in Japanese films, situating Japanese cinema within transnational film history. He examines the significant roles lighting played in distinguishing the styles of Japanese film from American and European film and the ways that lighting facilitated the formulation of a coherent new Japanese cultural tradition. Miyao discusses the influences of Hollywood and German cinema alongside Japanese Kabuki theater lighting traditions and the emergence of neon commercial lighting during this period. He argues that lighting technology in cinema had been structured by the conflicts of modernity in Japan, including capitalist transitions in the film industry, the articulation of Japanese cultural and national identity, and increased subjectivity for individuals. By focusing on the understudied element of film lighting and treating cinematographers and lighting designers as essential collaborators in moviemaking, Miyao offers a rereading of Japanese film history.

"“Film-history texts can often be dull, lack real insight beyond a litany of factual information, and plod along to foregone conclusions, structured as simply a lecture, where content overrides form. Daisuke Miyao's The Aesthetics of Shadow: Lighting and Japanese Cinema isn't only an exception to these rules, but establishes a benchmark for which contemporary film-history research should aim…[H]e achieves this, at least in part, by structuring his scholarship as more of a thriller, than merely the standard (and soporific) fact-upon-fact approach.”" - Slant Magazine

"“The book is grounded by exhaustive research; Miyao captures the debates surrounding shifts in lighting trends impeccably, … [it has an] interdisciplinary applicability to the fields of film, cultural studies and art history. The work articulates such a detailed understanding of cinematography and lighting practices that it would also be of great interest to cinematographers and related film practitioners.”" - Media International Australia

"In conclusion, the central thesis of this book problematizes much of what has been published in English on early Japanese cinema to date. As such, the work is a welcome addition to existing studies by Joanne Bernardi, Mitsuyo Wada-Marciano, and Aaron Gerow." - Journal of Japanese Studies

"This is a solid work, creating an insightful and persuasive argument for the relationship between a particular aesthetic and a particular ideological environment." - Pacific Affairs

"[Miyao] provides an... abundance of detail, but the overall approach is revelatory, culminating in a chapter about Japan's most celebrated cinematographer, Miyagawa Kazuo..." - Sight & Sound

"The Aesthetics of Shadow is an important contribution to the scholarship on cinema and modernity in Japan.... Anyone with a basic knowledge of Japanese film history will find the book accessible, but specialists in particular will welcome this study as an important and comprehensive new reference, especially as it pertains to Shōchiku and Tōhō." - Monumenta Nipponica