ncobb-watched's - Rented List

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A Japanese box-office sensation in 1968, Kuroneko is a sparse, atmospheric horror story, adhering to Kaneto Shindo's philosophy of using beauty and purity to evoke emotion.

Eccentric and more overtly supernatural than its breakthrough companion piece, Onibaba (1964), Kuroneko revisits similar themes to reveal a haunting meditation on duty, conformity and love. In this magnificently eerie and romantic film - loosely based on the Japanese folktale The Cat's Return - a mother and daughter-in-law (Nobuko Otowa and Kiwako Taichi) are raped and murdered by pillagers, but return from the dead as vampiric cat spirits intent on revenge. As the ghosts lure soldiers into the bamboo groves, a fearless samurai, Gintoki (Kichiemon Nakamura), is sent to stop their reign of terror.

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Made under the Franco regime, Victor Erice's astonishing 1973 feature debut is quite simply one of the most remarkable, influential and purely poignant films to emerge from the 1970's. A bona-fide classic of European cinema, the film brought Erice instant and widespread acclaim.

An audacious critique of the disastrous legacy of the Spanish Civil War, 'The Spirit of the Beehive' is set in a rural 1940's Spanish village haunted by betrayal and regret. Following a travelling cinema's screening of James Whale's Frankenstein, seven year-old Ana (the mesmerising Ana Torrent, later to grow into an international star of some standing) becomes fascinated with Boris Karloff's monster. Obsessed with meeting the initially gentle creation, she transfers her entrancement to tending a wounded army deserter. Atmospherically rendered by legendary Director of Photography Luis Cuadrado, it's impeccably performed by both Torrent and veteran actor Fernando Fernan Gomez in the role of her emotionally scarred, bee-keeping father. Existing in a highly evocative dreamlike state, it's a powerfully symbolic, richly allegorical tale that is as unique as it is beautiful.

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Since the death of his wife, Seibei's main concern is for his family. Invitations for drinks with fellow workers are refused in favour of getting home, and Seibei earns the nickname 'Twilight Samurai'.

Soon, a chance meeting with an old friend brings news of a lost childhood love, and a reunion makes an emotional impact upon both Seibei and his two daughters. But the woman is still married, and Seibei is forced to defend her honour by fighting the overbearing husband. As news of his fighting skills travels, Seibei is ordered by the ruling clan to serve as a Samurai in a matter of great importance. Stylish, moving and evocative, The Twilight Samurai tells the tale of a low-ranking retainer whose struggle to keep his family, and maintain his honour without resorting to the violence he denounces, is tested at every level.

When high-schooler Makoto (Miyuki Kuwano) is saved from the advances of a lecherous middle-aged man by uni student Kiyoshi (Yûsuke Kawazu), the pair embark on a fits-and-starts affair that finally settles into a sexually extortionary, mutually exploitative dependency that promises to spell their relationship's doom.

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The culmination of Imamura's extraordinary examinations of the fringes of Japanese society throughout the 1960s, Profound Desires of the Gods was an 18-month super-production which failed to make an impression at the time of its release, but has since risen in stature to become one of the most

legendary — albeit least seen — Japanese films of recent decades. Presenting a vast chronicle of life on the remote Kurage Island, the film centres on the disgraced, superstitious, interbred Futori family and the Tokyo engineer sent to supervise the creation of a new well — an encounter which leads to both conflict and complicity in strange and powerful ways.

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Tatsuya Nakadai and Toshiro Mifune star in this story of a wandering samurai who exists in a maelstrom of violence. A gifted swordsman plying his craft during the turbulent final days of shogunate rule in Japan, Ryunosuke (Nakadai) kills without remorse or mercy.

It is a way of life that ultimately leads to madness. Kihachi Okamoto's swordplay classic is the thrilling tale of a man who chooses to devote his life to evil.

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Based on the novel by Shichiro Fukazawa, the film recounts the ancient custom of younger inhabitants in a remote Japanese mountain village who are obliged to shepherd those over the age of seventy to the top of Mount Narayama to await their death.

One such elder must first sort out the lives of her three children before she fulfils her duty to the village.

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The first episode of the trilogy covers Miyamoto's formative years, as he emerges from rural obscurity to search for fame and glory in civil war, but returns home a broken man.

Brought back to sanity through the love of a warm hearted girl, she persuades him to place himself under the spiritual guidance of an unorthodox Buddhist priest. His methods of teaching the ways of enlightenment would make the fiercest of Zen masters seem positively gentle. Gaining in spiritual stature and insight, Miyamoto is forced to choose between settling for domestic happiness or continuing his search for perfection in the art of the sword.

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At the close of World War II, a Japanese army regiment in Burma surrenders to the British. Private Mizushima (Shôji Yasui) is sent on a lone mission to persuade a trapped Japanese battalion to surrender also.

When the outcome is a failure, he disguises himself in the robes of a Buddhist monk in hope of temporary anonymity as he journeys across the landscape - but he underestimates the power of his assumed role.

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In a magnificent performance. Tatsuya Nakadai stars as Hanshiro Tsugumo. a masterless down-and-out samurai who enters the manor of Lord lyi. requesting to commit ritual suicide on his property.

Suspected of simply fishing for charity, Hanshiro is told the gruesome tale of the last samurai who made the same request - but Hanshiro will not be moved...