Postcard (2010)

A hundred sailors are assembled in a room and told that they will be divided by lottery into three groups – 60 to go to the Philippines, 30 to go to submarine duty, and 10 to prepare another facility for men who will turn out to be kamikaze pilots. Sadazo is sent to the Philippines …

Will to Live / Ikitai (1999)

Made in his mid-eighties, Kaneto Shindo's Last Note had taken a look at aging for performing artists, with the last screen appearances of Nobuko Otowa and Haruko Sugimura. Now at age 87, Shindo takes a look at aging portrayed by a man, with Rentaro Mikuni, one of the last of the major postwar male stars …

Geisha House / Omocha (1998)

I suppose it was only a matter of time until the nostalgia movies of the nineties turned to the Gion of the fifties for a subject, but the nostalgic glow around Geisha House raises so many questions that it is difficult to know what to make of it. Based on an apparently original script* by …

Owl / Fukuro (2003)

At the age of ninety, in Owl Kaneto Shindo wrote and directed one of the sprightliest sex comedies I have come across from Japan at any time. Comedy is hardly the first thing that comes to mind when we mention Shindo but it was not unknown in his movies, with the often ribald Edo Porn …

A Last Note / Gogo no Yuigon-jo (1995)

Yoko Morimoto, an aging stage star, returns for a summer break to her home in the country before starting rehearsals for the next season of her own company. Expecting nothing but peace and quiet for the next few weeks, she finds something else entirely. She is met by the faithful caretaker and housemaid Toyoko and …

Strange Tale of Oyuki / Bokuto kitan (1992)

A middle-aged man with an umbrella walks down a crowded alley in the Tamanoi area during the thirties. As rain begins, a young woman asks for shelter under his umbrella. She invites him into her place to dry his clothes and offers him tea and then herself, for she is, like the other women in …

Actress / Eiga joyu (1987)

Kinuyo Tanaka was one of the most popular and admired actresses in Japanese movies, so it is no surprise to find that ten years after her death, Kon Ichikawa made a bio-pic about her life. To a considerable degree, her history is also the history of Japanese film in general, and Ichikawa also tries to …

Tree Without Leaves / Deciduous Trees / Rakuyoju (1986)

An old man walks through the snow and hears his mother calling him in to supper on a summer night, beginning a long journey into his childhood memories. Since the old man is a screenwriter now trying to write his first “novel,” we can assume this is an autobiographical film by Kaneto Shindo about his …

Stolen Pleasure / Tadare (1962)

Made just after Temple of the Wild Geese, Tadare once again places Ayako Wakao in the role of a mistress, but here she is a mistress who will fight for her man. Whether he is worth it, however, is a different question. Wakao is currently the mistress of Asai, played by the epitome of the …

Hokusai / Edo Porn / Hokusai manga* (1981)

In Kaneto Shindo’s Hokusai manga, we are given a ribald and vigorous look at the life of the famous artist generally known as Hokusai. Along the way, we get some lively recreations of the inspirations for some of his most famous works while we eventually reach an examination of the loss of artistic powers in …