Kwaidan (1964)

Highly Recommended

Japan

Feature Film

Original Title: 怪談

Director: Kobayashi Masaki

Writers: Mizuki Yōko, Lafcadio Hearn

Cinematographer: Miyajima Yoshio

Composer: Takemitsu Tōru

Cast: Mikuni Rentarō, Aratama Michiyo, Watanabe Misako, Nakadai Tatsuya, Kishi Keiko, Nakamura Katsuo, Tanba Tetsurō, Shimura Takashi , Nakamura Kanemon, Takizawa Osamu

With its incredibly bold use of colour, unsettlingly original use of sound and music, and wonderfully expressive production design, Kobayashi’s remarkable, painterly film – an anthology of ghost stories, encompassing tales of samurais and musicians, woodcutters and lords – is a work of great power and breathtakingly sensual beauty. Iain.Stott