by Allan Fish
(Japan 1966 96m) DVD1/2
Aka. Akai Tenshi
We may die tomorrow
p Ikuo Kobudera d Yasuzo Masumura w Ryozo Kasahara novel Yoriyoshi Arima ph Setsuo Kobayashi ed Tatsuji Nakashizu m Sei Ikeno art Shigeo Mano
Ayako Wakao (Nurse Sanura Nishi), Shinsuke Ashida (Doctor Okabe), Yusuke Kawazu (Private Orihara), Ranko Akagi (Nurse Iwashima), Ayako Ikegami (Nurse Tsurusaki), Kei’ichi Noda (General), Jotaro Senba, Daihachi Kita,
On the Region 2 UK DVD cover for this Japanese classic they refer to it as one of the most underexposed films of the period to western eyes. They are quite right. Try and find a listing for it in either the Halliwell, Maltin, Radio Times or even the Bloomsbury Foreign Film Guide if you can. There was a time when such neglect could have been down to slight regard, but here it’s simply down to really not knowing enough about it. Indeed, it’s a complaint one could make about many Masumura films, for you’ll struggle to find any film by the director in any of the above tomes. It’s as if the poor fellow never existed, when in actual fact, along with Oshima, Teshigahara, Shindo and Hani, he was at the vanguard of the new Japanese wave of directors in the sixties. To overlook him is a mistake that, thankfully, in the age of DVD when rarity upon rarity can now be resurrected and restored, that oversight can be corrected. (more…)
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