Kwaidan details
| Format: | 15 DVD |
|---|---|
| Starring: | Misako Watanabe, Rentaro Mikuni, Keiko Kishi, Tetsuro Tamba, Kanemon Nakamura, Katsuo Nakamura, Michiyo Aratama, Tatsuya Nakadai |
| Director: | Masaki Kobayashi |
| Genres: | Horror - Comedy, Sci-Fi/Fantasy, World Cinema - Japanese |
| Studio: | EUREKA ENTERTAINMENT |
| Name | Discs | |
|---|---|---|
Kwaidan |
15 Feature |
DVD Information
| Run time: | 3 hours 3 minutes |
|---|---|
| Rental release: | 29 May 2006 |
| Main languages: | Japanese |
| Subtitles: | English |
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Most helpful review
Beautiful, endearing and creepy
By Merlin from London, England , 10 Nov 2005[Highly rated reviewer]
I remember as a small boy my mother always telling me about Kwaidan and how it had an effect on her. It was never shown on TV when I was young so I watched it at the NFT in London at the age of 16. I was not disappointed.
Kwaidan is a tale of four seprate ghost stories. 'Black Hair': About a samurai who divorces his true love to marry for money, but when things go wrong he returns to his old wife, only to discover something is not as it should be. 'The Woman in the Snow': A woodcutter stranded in a snowstorm, meets an icy spirit who saves his life on the condition that he never tells anyone about her. He later forgets his promise. 'Hoichi the Earless': A talented blind musician, is commanded to perform for a ghostly imperial court in the monastery he resides in. The ghosts are draining away his life, and the monks set out to protect him by writing a holy mantra over his body to make him invisible to the ghosts. But something goes awry. 'In a Cup of Tea': a writer tells the story of a man who keeps seeing a mysterious face reflected in his cup of tea.
The scenes are beautifully set-up and obviously influenced Takeshi Kitano (see Dolls). The colours and ethereal mood created by the director Masaki Kobayashi draws you into another world. Kwaidan is a long film but engrossing. I suggest that it will become one of your favorite films, particularly if you are fond of Japanese cinema.- Was this review helpful to you?
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(24)Tantalising and elusive
By erp (67 reviews) from Manchester , 21 Nov 2011[Highly rated reviewer]
I have vivid memories of this film from seeing it forty two years ago. The slow-moving, stylised story telling won't be everyone's cup of tea but the formally composed scenes are visually beautiful and astonishing and the slow movement between them makes them linger in the imagination with a kind of tantalising suggestiveness.
Though I know very little about it I'd say that the visual and narrative style seems to owe a lot to noh and kabuki theatre with its ritualised gestures and obvious artifice used to distill and meaning and emotion.
My very favourite stories were the third and fourth - Hyoichi the Earless, which seemed to me to combine what I think of as Noh elements with its strangulated but strangely expressive and memorable singing and extreme freezing of gesture in presenting an old samurai story, and kabuki in the clowning of the temple servants, and In a Cup of Tea. In a Cup of Tea is haunting because it is so elliptical and leaves you to fill in so much in your own imagination. Hyoichi is moving in the way it brings together the cruelty of the old samurai world and the gentle piety and strength of the blind singer Hoichi. The film Conan steals from a scene in which Hoichi is covered with characters to hide him from the ghosts.- Was this review helpful to you?
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classic with narrative and intermission
By juradino (811 reviews) from London , 13 Mar 2011Black Hair, Snow Woman, Hoichi the Earless, and In a Cup of Tea are the titles of the four stories from ancient Japan. All in all it is 3 hours long. No cars, no guns, no drugs, no geishas, but plenty of samurai and dutiful wives with priests thrown in as well as spirits of the dead. Traditional treat.- Was this review helpful to you?
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This was stunning. A truly special movie.
By ozzy79 (6 reviews) from Brigg , 21 Dec 2010I haven't seen many films that leave a mark in my brain. This has to be one of them. I wasn't sure about it at first because of the three separate stories within one film approach. But that doesn't hurt the film at all. In fact, as each story ends I was left thinking..''what, did that just happen''? and then wanting more each time.The Japanese seem to have a very different way of making horror movies. They take away all the graphic gore of the Hollywood films and place much more emphasis on psychological terror and genuine shock (in a really cleverly crafted way). I suppose if you're not a fan of Japanese culture then this might just pass you by as a pretty confusing piece of art cinema. But I will say that without films like this there never would have been films like The Ring, The Grudge and Dark Water made, simple really. But if you are a fan then this is simply unmissable!.- Was this review helpful to you?
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A must for true fans of Japanese culture
By daijoubu (1 review) from Poole , 02 Dec 2010THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS Show review anywayHide
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Bad hair day and other stories
By angdavies (52 reviews) from Bruton , 27 Oct 2009Credit: the long black hair motif was clearly an important influence on Hideo Nakata’s The Ring. I like a good samurai flick at the best of times, though this is more a blend of supernatural folktales. All of the stories have strong narratives, and literally, haunting power. The supernatural forces are neutral-evil; they follow their own rules, which are usually to the detriment of the unfortunate humans who come upside them.
Debit: a bit too stagy for my taste. Sometimes this works when the human enters the pure otherworldly realm of the spirit forces. However, at other times, it just looks staged. Unfortunately, the final story starts very well, but seems to exit without any clear logic, supernatural or not. Also, the disc navigation is a bit dodgy.
Overall: very good folktales, well told, which are at times almost disturbing.- Was this review helpful to you?
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![Fear[s] of the Dark](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/lovefilm/gb/images/products/131043/packshot._UR77,109_V1349741074_Lovefilmgb131043_.jpg)
