Fright Club Live: Onibaba (1964)
Director: Kaneto Shindō Run Time: 103 min. Rating: NR Release Year: 1964
Starring: Jitsuko Yoshimura, Jûkichi Uno, Kei Satō, Nobuko Otowa, Taiji Tonoyama
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Country: Japan
Language: Japanese
About the film:
Deep within the wind-swept marshes of war-torn medieval Japan, an impoverished mother and her daughter-in-law eke out a lonely, desperate existence. Forced to murder lost samurai and sell their belongings for grain, they dump the corpses down a deep, dark hole and live off of their meager spoils. When a bedraggled neighbor returns from the skirmishes, lust, jealousy, and rage threaten to destroy the trio’s tenuous existence, before an ominous, ill-gotten demon mask seals the trio’s horrifying fate.
“a chilling movie, a waking nightmare shot in icy monochrome, and filmed in a colossal and eerily beautiful wilderness.”
—Peter Bradshaw, Guardian
Driven by primal emotions, dark eroticism, a frenzied score by Hikaru Hayashi, and stunning images both lyrical and macabre, Kaneto Shindo’s chilling folktale Onibaba is a singular cinematic experience.
