282. Sansho Dayu (Sansho the Bailiff) (1954)

Directed By Kenji Mizoguchi

Synopsis

The family of a disgraced but compassionate ex-governor is sold into slavery while travelling to visit him in exile. The mother is sold as a courtesan, and the son and daughter as labourers for Sansho, a cruel bailiff who tends the lands of the Minister of the Right. Hearing some news about their mother the daughter helps her brother escape. In order not to give away his destination she commits suicide. The escaped boy becomes governor and abolishes slavery, but too late to save his sister. He leaves office, as his actions of abolishing slavery would put him in a terrible position with the central government, and goes to meet his mother.

Review

Again Japanese cinema presents us with another winner. There are some similarities between this and Uguetsu Monogatari, not because of the plot but because Mizoguchi manages to emulate the same oppressive and slightly otherworldly feel.

There are no elements of the supernatural per se here, but there is a feeling of irresistible forces all played under a veneer of delicacy. As with most Japanese films of this time it is excruciatingly depressing, summed up better in the lyrics of the song endlessly repeated throughout the film: "Isn't life torture?"

There is a level of emotional honesty in Japanese cinema that was not mimicked by any other cinema in the 50s, even Italian neo-realism seems simplistic and manipulative next to it. The depression of Japanese cinema is admittedly not that of day to day life, but it stems from a deeper, more existential disappointment with human life in general, and in that way it is even more universal.

Final Grade

10/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

Sansho was the last of Mizoguchi's films to win an award at the Venice Film Festival, which brought him to the attention of Western critics and film-makers. It is greatly revered by many critics; The New Yorker film critic Anthony Lane wrote in his September, 2006 profile on Mizoguchi, "I have seen Sansho only once, a decade ago, emerging from the cinema a broken man but calm in my conviction that I had never seen anything better; I have not dared watch it again, reluctant to ruin the spell, but also because the human heart was not designed to weather such an ordeal."

Trailer: