A joruri narrator clad in raven black introduces us to Narayama Bushiko as heavy curtains reveal the backdrop of a tribal village. In the kabuki tradition, the samisen ballad speaks of a kind elderly woman, Orin, who is contemplating her ascent to Mount Narayama. This most stylized work by Kinoshita is also his most dramatically theatrical, replete with meticulously designed soundstages and dramatic lighting. A haunting allegory that shows the conflict between filial duty, tradition and social pressure, the same story was remade by Imamura Shohei decades later, but the original remains a startling, culturally resonant magnum opus. —Festival de Cannes

Director

Keisuke Kinoshita

Universally considered one of the greatest Japanese directors, Keisuke Kinoshita worked almost his entire career for Shochiku, the Japanese studio that also housed Yasujiro Ozu. Shochiku was that studio most devoted to what the Japanese call shomin-geki, stories of everyday life; yet while Ozu developed a rigorous, austere style that he perfected from film to film, Kinoshita was constantly changing, challenging himself to adapt to new subject matter and ways of storytelling. The director of Japan’s first color feature film, the charming musical satire Carmen Comes Home, could move just a few months later on to the bold experimentation just a few months later of A Japanese Tragedy, a work whose jumbled timeframe and insertion of newsreel footage anticipates the modernist films of the Sixties. He made bold use of traditional Japanese art forms such as kabuki (The Ballad of Narayama) and brush painting (The River Fuefuki), but could… read more

Kinoshita moved into the director’s chair after a traditional apprenticeship at the studio, and his familiarity with the many technical aspects of filmmaking led to his demanding the greatest effort from his crews. His two wartime films are forthrightly ambiguous in their view of militarism, and the arrival of the American occupation forces with their promotion of “democratic” ideals in the cinema suited Kinoshita perfectly. Perhaps the major theme that runs through his work is the loss of innocence: one character, usually the protagonist, at some point comes up against the harsh realities of the world. This emphasis on the individual, and his or her ability to craft their own choices, gave the early postwar films a progressive tine, but one can also sense the darkening of his vision as he moves into the Sixties. Although an early proponent for change in Japan, Kinoshita was clearly a man out of step with the vastly different country that had strayed from its traditions far more than anyone has ever imagined, as one can see in his final masterpiece, the remarkable The Scent of Incense.

It should also be said that Kinoshita was a terrific director of actors, and several—Kinuyo Tanaka, Hideo Takamine, Yuko Mochizuki, Keiji Sata—gave some of their greatest performances in his films. —Film Society of Lincoln Center

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AKFilmFan

21Mar13

Vibrant colors and kabuki-theatricality are in full display in this moving picture of a troubling and strict cultural custom.

Daniel S.

27Feb13

With a so gorgeous production design, the film could have been a Japanese fairy tale. It's not. The last scene atop Mount Narayama is one of the most moving I've seen in months. Masterpiece, no doubt.

Matthew_Lucas

14Feb13

Keisuke Kinoshita's breathtaking tale of the Japanese legend of Obasute, in which village elders must be taken to die atop Mount Narayama when they reach the age of 70, is a haunting exploration of strict adherence to tradition and the neverending cycle of mortality. Staged in the tradition of Kabuki theatre, the film is shot completely on sound stages, as if it were a filmed play, finding beauty in artifice.

HKFanatic likes this

Matt Reddick

12Nov12

The last act was particularly brilliant, where it became almost like a trance: You now know the inevitable is going to transpire and the music, lighting and set design are perfectly formed.

engin yd likes this