#645: KINOSHITA, Keisuke: The Ballad Of Narayama (1958)

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KINOSHITA, Keisuke (Japan)
The Ballad Of Narayama [1958]
Spine #645
Blu-ray


This haunting, kabuki-inflected version of a Japanese folk legend is set in a remote mountain village where food is scarce and tradition dictates that citizens who have reached their seventieth year must be carried to the summit of Mount Narayama and left there to die. The sacrificial elder at the center of the tale is Orin (Kinuyo Tanaka), a dignified and dutiful woman who spends her dwindling days securing the happiness of her loyal widowed son with a respectable new wife. Filmed almost entirely on cunningly designed studio sets, in brilliant color and widescreen, The Ballad of Narayama is a stylish and vivdly formal work from Japan's cinematic golden age, directed by the dynamic Keisuke Kinoshita.

98 minutes
Color
Monaural
in Japanese
2:35:1 aspect ratio
Criterion Release 2013
Director/Writers


Based on the novel by Shichirô Fukazawa.

Film Rating (0-60):

60

The Extras

The Booklet

Twenty-two page booklet featuring an essay by critic Philip Kemp.

Commentary

None.

Trailer and teaser

Extras Rating (0-40):

39

60 + 39 =

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