PROBLEMS OF POETICS thirty when he took over in 1924, Kido set out to change Japanese filmmaking. He promoted a staple product - American-influenced melodramas, home dramas, and comedies. Mixing laughter and tears, the 'Kamata-flavor' film was aimed at an urban female audience. Kido wanted films that, in his words, 'looked at the reality of human nature through the everyday activities of society.'5 The films might be socially critical, but their criticism was based on the hope that human nature was basically good. People struggle to better their lot, Kido believed, and this aspiration should be treated in 'a positive, warm-hearted, approving way.'6 With such films as Shimazu's Nichiyobi (Sunday, 1924), the 'Kamata flavor' was created. To produce a stream of such items, Kido instituted a training regimen. Besides introducing the promotion policy mentioned in Chapter 1, Kido revived the studio's acting school and established a script 'research center' at which Kogo Noda trained beginners. Noda has recalled that every scriptwriter had to turn out one serious script and three nansensu scripts per month.7 Directors worked just as hard. Between 1924 and 1928, Yasujiro Shimazu, Kamata's most celebrated director, made fifty-eight features, or about one a month. Kido sent his staff out in teams to study new films and to report back with analyses of plot, cinematography, and direction.8 Directors dealt with Kido without intermediary, and he would approve scripts and finished films, often demanding rewriting or reshooting. Kido's policy of imitating American decoupage also encouraged the development of what I shall shortly call the 'piecemeal' style. Kido's policies favored cooperative work. We have already seen how Shochiku's young staff formed the equivalent of the business company's batsu. Camaraderie over sake or on the baseball diamond led to collaborations and the exchange of ideas. While Ozu and his friends worked late editing prints, Shiro Kido and Ozu in the late 1950s 20