Kwaidan - Lisa's Review

This is probably the hardest movie I've ever had to review.  I'm still sitting here wondering how I'm going to review it.  I'll be honest, I fell asleep again and again and again.  I don't know if that is particularly fair to the movie, as I'm not sure whether the repetitive sleeping was due to the movie or lack of sleep.

Kwaidan is a 1964 movie directed by Masaki Kobayashi, made up of 4 folks tales by Koizumi Yakumo... yup another oldie, but you know what?  I honestly don't think there was ANYTHING about the movie that would alert you to the fact that it is actually that old.  It looked like many Japanese movies I have watched.  They seem timeless in their style.  This movie looks wonderful.




Black Hair - This story follows a married Samuri called Kyoto.  He is unhappy in his marriage as he is poor and feels he can do better than stay with his loyal wife.  He divorces his loving wife to marry the daughter of a rich lord.  However when he spends time away from his first wife and finds out how cold, harsh and nasty his new wife is, he longs for his old life back, poverty and all.  However, he soon finds out his actions have a consequence.

The Woman in the Snow - A young man called Minokichi and his master Mosaku are caught in the middle of a snow storm.  While sheltering in a hut, a beautiful woman dressed in white comes in and seems to suck the life force from the older Mosaku, but decides to spare Minokichi with the condition that he most never speak of that night to anyone.  She then leaves and when the door to the hut swings open, where she should have been, walking away, she has gone.  Minokichi marries, has 3 children and manages to keep the secret, until one night that is.  It has fateful consequences.

I was still awake by this stage.....

Hochi The Earless - I will start by saying I fell asleep time after time while watching this section.  I don't know whether I can blame the movie on my sleepiness, but surely were it interesting enough, I wouldn't have had such a  problem staying conscious.  This section follows a blind musician who lives with Buddhist monks.  He is convinced to play for a rich man, not knowing that in actual fact he is playing for the ghosts of an emperor and his warriors who were killed years ago in battle.  The Buddhists try to save Hochi by covering him in invisible spells by writing on his entire body.  They neglect his ears and they are still visible when the Samurai comes looking for him.  The actual section is mostly a depiction of the battle done in arty farty style.  I think that's why I lost interest.  I'm like who's fighting who and why?  while I'm trying (in vain) to work out WTAF is happening, it happened - the snoozy snooze.

By this time, I was in and out of sleep and had used the rewind button more times than I would like...

In a Cup of Tea -  This is a story within a story.  A writer is wondering why any other writer would leave a story unfinished.  In his research he starts reading a story about a man who sees a reflection of another man in his cup of water.  He encounters this person later when he is on guard.  He is forced into a fight, but soon realises his assailant is a ghost who never tires and disappears when he tries to strike out.   The man encounters more ghosts the next night, but in the midst of fighting, the story cuts back to our author who ironically hasn't finished his story.

So positives first.  This movie looked wonderful.  The cinematography was beautiful (especially in the switching scene in 'The Woman in the Snow').  You would be VERY hard pressed to guess this movie was made as long ago as 1964.  It has a timeless and distinctly Japanese feel to it.  If I had lots of time to kill and wanted to watch something different, then I'm sure I would have enjoyed it much more, but saying as we're supposed to be watching horrors, I struggled to see why this was on the list and what exactly was horrific about it.

I cannot recommend this movie as I struggled staying awake.  I'd maybe say if you have a love of all things Japanese (and I don't mean Japanese horror), then give it a whirl, but I would imagine 90% of people would find this movie pretty dull.  I won't give the movie an 'avoid' either as it is obviously so beautiful to watch.

I'm just glad to get to the end of the review!!!!