Mikio Naruse is one of the least known of Japan’s early master directors, both in the West and in Japan, yet he created some of the most moving, darkly beautiful works in Japanese cinema. Like Kenji Mizoguchi, Naruse showed an uncanny understanding for the psychology of women. Like Yasujiro Ozu, he preferred subtle shifts of character over broad strokes of plot. Unlike either of these early greats, however, Naruse’s vision of humanity was much darker and more clinical. He stripped all vestiges of hope or acceptance from his films, what remains is only a willful struggle to endure. His relentlessly negative view of human existence has resulted in Naruse’s often being labeled a nihilist.
Born in Tokyo, in 1905, Naruse was the youngest of three sons of a desperately poor embroiderer. Although he excelled in elementary school, his family could not afford to further his education. He was instead enrolled in a two-year technical school. There, he spent virtually all of his free time… read more
Naruse's last film, an elegant, depressing romance between a widow and the remorseful driver who accidentally killed her husband. As with Naruse's best films, which this is one, the conventions of society, economy, modesty, and tradition act as barriers to any kind of long term happiness. With a sweeping, typically lovely score by Toru Takemitsu.
Naruse ends his film making journey with a premise that we are used to associate with him. Here we have another dysfunctional relationship between a man and a woman whose husband gets killed in a car… read review