DVD Review: The Ballad of Narayama (1958)

By Rowena Santos Aquino
February 7, 2013 Home Video, Reviews No Comments

Cast: , ,
Director: Keisuke Kinoshita
Country: Japan
Genre: Drama

Editor’s Notes: Fukazawa Shichiro’s The Ballad of Narayama was released on Criterion Blu-ray and DVD on February 5, 2013.

At the mention of film adaptations of Fukazawa Shichiro’s 1956 debut novel The Ballad of Narayama, one perhaps thinks first of Imamura Shohei’s 1983 work of the same title, not only because it is a more recent adaptation but because Imamura is a much more famous name than Kinoshita Keisuke (and it won the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival). But in the postwar era of the 1940s to the 1960s, Kinoshita was as much a household name in Japan as his more internationally known colleagues like Kurosawa Akira, Ozu Yasujiro, Naruse Mikio, and Ichikawa Kon. More specifically, Kinoshita’s earlier adaptation of The Ballad of Narayama, only several years after the book’s publication, is a highly interesting work that deserves an opportunity to be viewed more. This week, the Criterion Collection affords this opportunity with the DVD/BRD release of the film. Given the time when The Ballad of Narayama was released, it serves as a notable bridge between the above-mentioned older generation of filmmakers and the new generation of younger filmmakers, like Imamura, cropping up—and proves Kinoshita’s cinematic exploratory nature.

Given the time when The Ballad of Narayama was released, it serves as a notable bridge between the above-mentioned older generation of filmmakers and the new generation of younger filmmakers…

Even before its first image, the film declares its exploratory nature with sounds of the nagauta—literally, ‘long song,’ a samisen-based musical accompaniment to kabuki theatre—greeting the spectator. Leaving no doubt as to the film’s translation of kabuki theatre in cinematic terms, the film’s first shot is of a kuroko (stagehand) in front of a curtain, beating two thick sticks of wood to signal the start of the play, or in this case, the film. After the opening credits, the curtain is drawn to present the film proper, shot entirely in a studio.

Culled from a Japanese folktale and elaborated by Fukazawa, The Ballad of Narayama tells of the enforced practice of obasute, bringing elderly persons on a mountain and leaving them to die, in a remote mountain village due to the scarcity of food. This practice is presented through the experiences of one family, when loving, widowed son Tatsuhei (Takahashi Teiji) must eventually bring his aging mother Orin (Tanaka Kinuyo) to Mt. Narayama. What would normally be an episodic, idyllic portrait of a family in a small village becomes near hellish and full of torment, given the context of impending abandonment and thus the meaning of filial duty turned on its head.

The film’s translation of kabuki theatre in cinematic terms to tell its story of obasute, Tatsuhei, and Orin operates on several levels. One, its aural multilayeredness. With nagauta providing exposition to avoid wordy dialogue, but also to establish and maintain a mournful tone for the images and to engage with the narrative fabric of the actors’ dialogue, the film is a compelling multilayered text of differing voices, sounds, and perspectives. Emotion and memory are softly created and expressed through voiceovers and nagauta.

Two, its play with two- and three-dimensional space. The camera’s constant mobility draws out the static décor on the one hand, and the element of movement and pose that characterises Kabuki performance on the other hand. The result is a strange, fantastical narrative space, filled with strange, fantastical characters and stylised movement. The stillness of the décor and place due to the absence of wind makes the film have an even more otherworldly tone and feeling, making of the film like a mournful song performed in cinematic terms. The journey to Narayama and back is at its most poignant (and horrifying) when snow begins to fall. The snow brings out the beauty of the sets, but also the horrific reality of what obasute means.

The film thus presents a graceful, foregrounded balance of physical performance, voice, music, and camera movement. Each element stands out from the rest but also flows into the others at the same time.

An eerie blend of happiness and horror entails, due to the psychological toll of the practice of obasute across all generations of a family. Tatsuhei’s love for his mother as well as guilt for having to fulfill his duty of obasute; Orin’s shame of having a healthy set of teeth and then her pride at breaking them to better look the part for obasute; family bickering due to the dearth of food and Orin’s presence as a seeming obstacle to getting food; Tatsuhei’s new wife’s goodness and affection for Orin, coupled with grief knowing that Orin must eventually leave. Extend ‘family’ to the village and you have a paranoid, tense scenario that explodes in a lynch mob-like mentality against Amaya, another elder in the village who rebels against being taken to Narayama to die.

Three, its expressive lighting.  Lighting becomes a pliable character unto itself here, serving to visualise the passing of time; a close-up (along with the literal close-up provided by the camera); and mood, or literally, the emotional colour of a scene.

The film thus presents a graceful, foregrounded balance of physical performance, voice, music, and camera movement. Each element stands out from the rest but also flows into the others at the same time. The film’s foregrounding of its theatricality actually anticipates Kobayashi Masaki’s own stylised anthology film, Kaidan (1964), as well as Shinoda Masahiro’s even more heavily stylised work Double Suicide (1969). While ultimately not as absorbing in its impact than in its execution, as some parts of Kaidan and Double Suicide in its entirety, The Ballad of Narayama is undoubtedly Kinoshita’s boldest work and possesses strong emotional moments.

DVD Extras:

Slim pickings here—teaser and trailer—but given that Kinoshita’s films are lesser known and are therefore not as available as those of his colleagues, the digital master from the 2011 restoration of the film is quite gorgeous and provides ample food for thought, supported by Philip Kemp’s essay.

83/100 ~ GREAT. While ultimately not as absorbing in its impact than in its execution, as some parts of Kaidan and Double Suicide in its entirety, The Ballad of Narayama is undoubtedly Kinoshita’s boldest work and possesses strong emotional moments.
By Rowena Santos Aquino
Senior Film Critic. Recently obtained my doctoral degree in Cinema and Media studies at UCLA. Linguaphile and cinephile, and therefore multingual in my cinephilia. Asian cinemas, Spanish language filmmaking, Middle Eastern cinemas, and documentary film.