1953 ‘雨月物語’ Directed by Kenji Mizoguchi
In 16th century Japan, peasants Genjuro and Tobei sell their earthenware pots to a group of soldiers in a nearby village, in defiance of a local sage's warning against seeking to profit from warfare. Genjuro's pursuit of both riches and the mysterious Lady Wakasa, as well as Tobei's desire to become a samurai, run the risk of destroying both themselves and their wives, Miyagi and Ohama.
Contos da Lua Vaga Depois da Chuva, Ugetsu - kalpean kuun tarinoita, Ugetsu Monogatari, 우게쓰 이야기, Tales of Moonlight and Rain, Tales of Ugetsu
A glorious cinematic feast for the eyes! A haunting tale with supernatural overtones that will beguile you with its powerfully seductive storyline about man's lust for money and power! And how easily they will sacrifice everything truly meaningful to get it!
A masterfully crafted fable filled with consequences, great loss, regrets and redemption!
65/100
This troubles me.
For as long as I've maintained a film log ("Since 1992"), I've made a point of noting theatrical screenings vs. any form of home video. That's because I don't fully trust the latter. The advent of first DVD and then Blu-ray has helped, to be sure, and I'm not one of those zealots who insists that you haven't seen the movie unless/until you've seen a good 35mm print. But I do often wonder, when underwhelmed by a classic that had previously made me swoon on celluloid, whether seeing it in a diminished condition is largely responsible for the shift.
Here's something I wrote on a private forum after watching Tsai Ming-liang's The River twice in quick…
🎧don't go chasin waterfalls
cuz a sex ghost at the end will seduce you🎤
Ugetsu is based partially from a classic Japanese folklore literature "Tales of Moonlight and Rain" by author Ueda Akinari. Upon seeing the film again I really want to venture out and find this collection of stories. Mizoguchi's film brilliantly and flawlessly mixes Japanese folklore and morality tales of war, greed and consequence into an unforgettable film experience.
Japanese folklore and culture has always been a huge fascination for me. Ever since I begun developing a love for cinema, I had noticed my draw was mostly towards Japanese films and films by Ingmar Bergman. There is just something about the films from Japan, either that or its a stated fact that Japan is just simply a cinematic prosperous country. I mean…
For a film that remains one of the glories of fantastic cinema, Mizoguchi’s achievement in giving Ugetsu a strong sense of place is remarkable.
Part beautiful morality fable, part haunting ghost story, part war film, part love story, part social period drama, and a full on fucking extraordinary piece of cinema.
War makes for a dicey game of Chutes and Ladders, for lack of a better analogy. A time where stability is traded for chaos, and one has the ability to rise quite dramatically, or fall quite tragically, in a stunningly short amount of time.
Genjuro sees an opportunity to make a small fortune selling his handcrafted pots to a group of soldiers, despite being warned by a sage against attempting to profit from warfare. His neighbor and coworker Tobei hopes the newfound conflict will allow him to realize his dream of achieving glory as a respected samurai. Both men pursue their respective dreams at the expense of their wives, who suffer greatly in the wake of their selfishness.
At first…
Kenji Mizoguchi's period masterpiece is full everything that makes world cinema incredible.
An incredible cinematic experience. I honestly did not know this film was revered so highly. I randomly decided to watch it and was in awe with everything. The shots were framed in this film is a lost art in film and needs to be revived. The cinematography was incredible, the entire boat scene made my jaw drop. How was this made in the 50s? The underlying themes and overall message was great. The parallels between the two brothers were necessary to make the viewers understand clearly what was being presented to them. The entire film was amazing, and I dare say it is probably the best Japanese film I have seen so far.
Hauntingly beautiful. Decided to watch this on a whim for film 700 and wound up extremely satisfied.
mmmmm yes cinema
A haunting and entrancing tale of men lead astray. I wasn't totally engaged with the first half; while graceful in execution, the individual scenes felt too discordant from one another. However, after shit REALLY starts going down in the second half, the quiet yet powerful themes of this film begin to intermingle and shine through. Despite having relatively little screentime, the females here form the thematically iron-clad backbone of the film, and I found myself immediately grabbed by any shot containing them. Love how despite being a male-driven film in terms of where the screentime lies, the females ultimately get the last words of the story, towering over the film in their wake. And that last shot... MIC DROP.
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