Woman in the Dunes
Suna no onna
Japan
1964
147 Min
Black and White
1.33:1
Japanese
Synopsis
One of the sixties’ great international art-house sensations, Woman in the Dunes was for many the grand unveiling of the surreal, idiosyncratic worldview of Hiroshi Teshigahara. Eija Okada plays an amateur entomologist who has left Tokyo to study an unclassified species of beetle that resides in a remote, vast desert; when he misses his bus back to civilization, he is persuaded to spend the night in the home of a young widow (Kiyoko Kishida) who lives in a hut at the bottom of a sand dune. What results is one of cinema’s most bristling, unnerving, and palpably erotic battles of the sexes, as well as a nightmarish depiction of everyday Sisyphean struggle, for which Teshigahara received an Academy Award nomination for best director. —The Criterion Collection
Director
Hiroshi Teshigahara
Hiroshi Teshigahara (勅使河原 宏, Teshigahara Hiroshi?, January 28, 1927 – April 14, 2001) was an avant-garde Japanese filmmaker.
He was born in Tokyo, son of Sofu Teshigahara, founder and grand master of the the Sogetsu School of ikebana. He graduated in 1950 from the Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music and directed his first film, Pitfall (1962), in collaboration with author Kōbō Abe and musician Tōru Takemitsu. The film won the NHK New Director’s award, and throughout the 1960s, he continued to collaborate on films with Abe and Takemitsu while simultaneously pursuing his interest in ikebana and sculpture on a professional level.
In 1965, the Teshigahara/Abe film Woman in the Dunes (1964) was nominated for an Academy Award and won the Special Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival. In 1972, he worked with Japanese researcher and translator John Nathan to make the movie Summer Soldiers, a film set during the Vietnam War about American deserters living on the fringe… read more
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Displaying 4 of 33 wall posts.
Alexander Robino
4Jan12
Blew me away a little - always nice these days. Could return to this film many times.
JP. Schmidt likes this
PoutingBear
21Dec11
I'm aware that a certain amount of length is needed to make this a claustrophobic and disconcerting watch (on account of the subject matter), but I felt that this, much like the book it is based on, was just too long. Also, unlike Kafka's characters, Abe's protagonists are not at all likeable; both in this and in The Face of Another I found myself feeling that they deserved their fates. That said, it was enthralling.
Francisco R.
16Dec11
A wonderfully suggestive, multilayered allegory about life and relationships, with a narrative flow resembling both the work of Alain Resnais and the classic japanese dramas showcasing the visual sensitivity of Teshigahara. I've never seen a movie so assured of its thoughtfulness withuout falling into the depths of existentialist gloom or other type of heavy handed pacing, using instead suspense of the highest order.
Christopher likes this
Tyler1
2Dec11
Woman in the dunes stands in between classic japanese cinema (ozu,mizo,kuro) and post modern japanese cinema. As such, critics cannot reference this film to any other. In the 60s, violence and sex were appearing on japanese screens. Dismissed as a cheap erotica movie, this film has been neglected by many. Camus would be proud of this.
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Reviews
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Does He Want To Go Back?
By Jonathan A. on January 5, 2011
Woman in the Dunes is a classic Japanese film from 1964 that explores themes of society, alienation and human nature from a very offbeat point of view. It has become a film who’s images and meanings… read review
Woman In the Dunes
By Gino on June 24, 2010
Woman In the Dunes is one of the greatest Films I’ve ever seen. It’s a sparkling gem in the Japanese Films of the 1960s. I was captivated in the first few minutes alone, and already had a sense that… read review
Woman In The Dunes
By Joe Wakeman on April 24, 2010
Woman In The Dunes read review
The strength of Hiroshi Teshigahara’s Woman In The Dunes lies in its resistance to the temptation to tell the audience exactly what they want to hear…Woman in the Dunes
By Law on December 27, 2009
Thoroughly fascinating, heavily existential, technically competent, strongly structured and crafted, Woman in the Dunes is utterly fantastic and amongst the greatest films I have ever seen. Packed… read review
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Are Hiroshi Teshigahara's other films not up to snuff?
12 posts by 7 people
11 months ago
Woman in the Dunes - Masterpiece?
37 posts by 26 people
about 2 years ago
DVD
Buy the DVD from The Criterion Collection.
