Best Actress in a Supporting Role 1957: Miyoshi Umeki in Sayonara

Miyoshi Umeki won the Oscar from her first nomination for her performance as Katsumi Kelly in Sayonara.

Sayonara is a rather weak film about a US air force major who opposes marriages about American services and Janapese women has to overcome his own prejudice when he falls in love with a beautiful woman in Japan. I've never really cared for this movie, and on a rewatch I liked it even less: the central romance is incredibly boring due to Marlon Brando and Miiko Tana having absolutely no chemistry, the subplot about the American girlfriend is flat and standard and while the one involving Gruver's (Brando) friend and his wife is not that bad it's not on screen enough to save this dull movie. The cinematography is occasionally quite good, but that's about it.

Miyoshi Umeki plays Katsumi, a sweet Japanese woman who marries Joe Kelly, Gruver's fellow serviceman and best friend. This is an extremely unpopolar win nowadays, with people ranking her among the worst Oscar wins of all time. It's not hard to understand why - it's an extremely small performance with very little dialogue and overall just not much to do. It's certainly quite odd that this is the only Oscar-winning performance from an Asian actress considering that Machiko Kyo did not receive any recognition for her beautiful work in Rashomon and Floating Weeds (and she is only one of the many possible examples). Umeki's is not even the best performance from an Asian actress from 1957 - Isuzu Yamada was simply amazing in Throne of Blood and she is supposedly also very strong in The Lower Depths from the same year. But this does not necessarily mean it's a bad performance: to be perfectly honest, I actually quite like what she does on-screen during her limited appearence. In her first scene, she barely speaks at all - in fact, it's Red Buttons as Joe who has almost all of the lines, often speaking in her behalf - but she still leaves quite a lovely impression and her chemistry with Buttons, while not anything groundbreaking, is very tender to watch. They don't share all that many scenes together but the sincerity of their love is never in question due to the honesty of Buttons' and Umeki's performance. Her second scene is not really demanding either, but she again makes for a sweet, endearing presence; actually I can sort of understand why someone would see her performance as incredibly dull, but I think her approach works for the character who is supposed to not know much English and her slow-paced line-deliveries work quite well in conveying Katsumi's simple and down-to-earth personality. Her few scenes later on in the movie are probably her most memorable and they are the ones in which Umeki is asked to do a little more: the first one of these scenes is the one in which Joe finds out Katsumi had been planning to undergo a surgery in order to make her eyes look Caucasian - Umeki makes the scene rather touching and her delivery of "Then I have good eyes, I fool everybody... I look like Joe... I want him to be proud of me" as she struggles through the tears is extremely affecting. And her last scene when Katsumi and Joe are watching a puppet show in which the characters of the star-crossed lovers kill themselves because they can't face life any longer and Katsumi dreamily utters: "It is so beautiful... They will live in an another world, on a beautiful lake... Floating always together, like water lillies". It's a very simple line, even a not particularly inspired one, but Umeki's delivery is very moving in its quietness and her facial reactions in this scene are rather impressive. 

So, yes, contrary to most people, I don't hate this performance all - but to be honest there is not much to get wrong in the role. As I mentioned before, Buttons is the one who speaks the most in their scenes together and Umeki is mostly required to just stand still smiling warmly at Buttons' and Brando's characters - she's forced to be an extremely passive presence and even if it's very easy for me to enjoy her time on-screen I also forgot quickly about her after each of her scenes was over. She is probably one of the strongest elements of Sayonara - but, still, being one of the best things of a pretty bad movie is not a particularly outstanding achievement and even if she leaves a bigger impact than the film does, I still never found her performance to be particularly lasting. It's not her fault and I think that if she had a little more to do on paper and a larger screen-time she would have been a solid contender for the Oscar, but this performance amounts to little more than nothing. Obviously you feel for her character but, even if Umeki does deserve a little merit for it, the role itself was bound to get an emotional reaction from the audience - the truth is the character is more memorable for its tragic fate rather than for Umeki's execution of the part. 

Overall, this is a perfectly competent performance - Umeki is rather sweet in the role and she does exactly what she is required to do in the role. But despite a couple of emotionally resonant moments Umeki ultimately does not have enough to do to leave a lasting impression - her love story with Red Buttons is much more effective than Brando's and Miiko Tana's, but still there is no denying that Joe and Katsumi get very little focus, screen-time and attention from the movie. It's a nice bit of work from an obviously fine actress and I'm tempted to be generous with her as I did like what she did - but at the same time I can't deny the fact that what she does is almost nothing.

2.5/5