Life of an Amorous Man / A Lustful Man / Koshoku ichidai otoko (1961)

Saikaku Ihara's Koshoku ichidai otoko of 1682 was one of the most significant and popular novels of the Tokugawa era, all but unknown outside Japan primarily because there have been no translations. The title is usually translated as Life of an Amorous Man, to parallel his later Life of an Amorous Woman that was the …

Chaos of Flowers / Hana no ran (1988)

Chaos of Flowers looks at part of the life of Akiko Yosano, one of the most famous Japanese poets of the early 20th century, whose personal and relatively sexually explicit tanka poems made her a lightning rod for all kinds of political and social movements of the time. After the war, however, she was all …

Profound Desires of the Gods / Kamigami no fukaki yokubo (1968)

One of the most persistent themes of Japanese movies since the war has been the collision of “new” and “old” Japan, but rarely has that conflict been more obvious or intense than in Profound Desires of the Gods. However, where most such movies depict  a conflict between Euro/Americanism and the Japan of the Tokugawa & …

An Actor’s Revenge / Yukinojo henge (1959)

The basic story is relatively well known through the 1963 remake of the same title issued by Criterion. However, as I became more interested in Hashizo Okawa, a significant star all but unknown outside Japan, I finally managed to find a DVD of his version of the story. I wish I hadn't bothered. Like Raizo …

Odd Obsession / The Key / Kagi (1959)

Odd Obsession is the first of many screen adaptations of Tanizaki's novel Kagi, whose subject matter would be irresistible to later pinku directors and even provide the source for one of  Tinto Brass's better sex films. It is an extremely perverse, even kinky film, made more so by the fact that it was produced under the …

Tale of Genji / Genji monogatari (1951)

Murasaki's Genji Monogatari is of course unfilmable, if for nothing else due to its length, and so any attempt is always going to be a sampling at best. This particular sampling comes with the finest pedigree, with the basic adaptation made by Tanizaki, the screenplay by Kaneto Shindo, and direction by Yoshimura. The result is …

Osaka Monogatari/ An Osaka Story (1957)

There are so many interesting aspects of Osaka monogatari  that it isn't easy to know where to start. The outline of the story is simple enough. A peasant family unable to pay their taxes runs away to Osaka. On the verge of starvation, they begin sweeping up rice that has leaked out of the carriers, …