Kurutta ippêji (1926)

Director:

Teinosuke Kinugasa

Writers:

Yasunari Kawabata (short story)
Yasunari Kawabata (adaptation) ...

Release Date:

January 1975 (USA)

Genre:

Drama | Horror

Plot:

A man takes a job at an asylum with hopes of freeing his imprisoned wife. |

Plot Keywords:

Asylum | Dream Sequence | 1920s | Japan | Avant Garde

Cast

Masuo Inoue	...	Custodian
Yoshie Nakagawa	...	Custodian's wife
Ayako Iijima	...	Daughter
Hiroshi Nemoto	...	Young Man
Misao Seki	...	Doctor
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Eiko Minami	...	Dancing girl
Kyosuke Takamatsu	...	Second madman
Minoru Takase	...	First madman
Tetsu Tsuboi	...	Third madman

Also Known As:

A Crazy Page
A Page of Madness
Kurutta ichipêji (Japan) (alternative transliteration)
Kurutta ichipeiji (Japan) (alternative transliteration)

Runtime:

59 min (1975 sound version) | 78 min (2007 restoration) (18 fps)

Country:

Japan

Language:

None

Colour:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.33 : 1

Sound Mix:

Silent

Company:

Kinugasa Productions

Trivia:

Director Teinosuke Kinugasa had so little money to make this film, that his stars - some of them rather big names - had to help paint sets, push the dolly and make props. He had only eight small lights to work with, so he painted the walls of his small studio silver to make them reflect additional illumination.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Le fantôme d'Henri Langlois (2004)

A vision in delirium

This very strange movie is unlike anything made in the west at the time. With its tumultuous emotions and net of visions, dreams, and startling images, its effect is both beautiful and unsettling. The actors are choreographed more like dance than acting. It contains the only dream sequence I know of that actually resembles a real nightmare (sorry, Dali fans).