Another fine Kinoshita melodrama, but why the flamenco score?
I implore anyone with an interest in Japanese cinema (or cinema in general) to seek out this pitch black anti-war satire from the underrated Okamoto. If nothing else, you'll see Chishu Ryu as you never have before.
One of the masterpieces of Japanese New Wave cinema.
A bit of a misstep from the otherwise excellent Yoshida. At times plays like a pastiche of 60's European art cinema.
Flawed and then some, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't have a great time.
As Ms. Sontag is no longer with us, I'll make it my duty to watch this every year for the rest of my life.
I'm tempted to do that as well, but I don't want to see it again unless it's on a bigger screen and/or in a smaller timeframe. It took me 48 hours to watch it on a 24" LED 1080p television, but I want to see it someday with two intermissions in a theater.
Haneke in a recent Film Comment interview: "Since puberty, I've always defined myself by taking a certain distance. I see it even in everyday conversations. That's also why I'm not good at accepting accolades. How should I say...As soon as a majority takes shape, I'm against it on principle. It's instinctive. Whenever people agree on everything, I get aggressive."
Kinuyo Tanaka giving Chishu Ryu a piggyback. That's enough for me.
A hypnotic masterpiece.
A moving and somewhat melodramatic tale of two young friends whose lives take radically different paths. Dora opts for domesticity, while Sunako (brilliantly played by Oikawa Michiko) sinks into life as a Mizoguchi-style fallen woman. Shimizu Hiroshi's reputation as a visual innovator is on full display here as he employs jump-cuts, dissolves, and surprisingly modern camera movements. All of which may have prompted Ozu to proclaim: "I can't shoot films like Shimizu."
