Gaki zôshi

An arduous rain drenched trek leads a frail teenage girl to collapse on the steps of a hill top Buddhist Temple.. The youthful resident monk takes her in and along with his motherly helper they nurse the mysterious girl back to health. The homeless girl comfortably settles into the austere lifestyle, secure within the sanctity of the temple refuge. Her presence inevitably draws obsessive attentions. Desecrating the purity of the sacred shrine a violation initiates an affair, one which fractures the rigid harmony of the spiritual realm, clouding the clarity of the devout priest. .

"Not standing upon words"... A dialogue free film , sparse as it is, conversation is muted, clearly audible are grounding everyday sounds providing an evocative & tangible natural reality. With striking composition and varying rhythms, multi themes are vividly presented often with dissolving seemingly random imagery...very Zen. Experimental, independent filmmaker Yoichi Takabayashi intricately creates a unique, profoundly expressive work of cinematic art.

A story with no words, however it is a story that has so much to say.... Gaki in the films title references Hungry Ghosts... In Japanese Buddhism these spirits, punished for their mortal vices, have been cursed with an insatiable hunger... emerging from an unhappy death or where there is neglect or desertion of venerable ancestors. Highly Recommended for Classic Japanese film enthusiasts...

Landscapes of the beach introduces us a young girl who seems lost in the pouring rain, she keeps walking without a clue nor does have an idea about her destination. She enters into a Buddhist temple and collapses, later we see a monk and an elderly maid who takes care of the girl. She finds refuge in the secluded temple, away from the noise of the outside world, accompanies the maid for shopping and lives a zen life. I'm revisiting this just to hear the sound of the rain, the visual aesthetics and for the crazy black and white cinematography.

Coming back, things take a wild turn when the girl becomes involved in an affair. From here the doomed hungry spirit comes to haunt and the story of the monk's sexual obsession is told wholly on a psychological level and affirms his character arc downfall with visual representation. He chants prayer to drive away the young guy from the vicinity of the temple. Later he watches them making out, this doesn't go well as he loses himself to temptation, sniffs the panties of the girl and jerks off on the Buddha statue. The body is filth again, and he tries to outrun and to die with it. The film ends with the elderly maid closing the gates of temple fading in a ghostly effect. I was thinking of André Delvaux's The Man Who Had His Hair Cut Short (1965), a tragic forgotten masterpiece and attempting to draw parallels with the priest character.

In closing, Yôichi Takabayashi keeps everything casual and predictable till the very end. It is a very honest film, but doesn't rank as his best. I have seen Double Suicide at Nishijin (1977), Kinkakuji (1976), Irezumi (1982) and Death at an Old Mansion (1975). I would mention that this film is made with minimal budget, devoid of dialogues, something really small, but done quite masterfully.

I didn't expect that much about this film when I rent it, but sooner I'm impressed by those beautiful and weird expression of adolescence. I didn't realize how great Takabayashi were until I saw this film, I didn't even know him at that point but he's a real fine artist who got lots of imagination and ideas of how to express dreams, a dream like everyone dreamed once. Not only trouble about sexuality of adolescence but any age of people who's suffering about sex. He's attached to express people's dream who got some sexual problems in many situations all the time. I'd like to recommend this film international. This is one of the most beautiful psychological description picture I ever saw including, Antonioni, Weir, Maya Deren or Teshigahara. It's a shame that he didn't ever introduced through out the world so big, like other Japanese directors Kurosawa or Ozu, but I think the most terrible thing is that he didn't even known in Japan more than international. He's one of the artist who live in obscurity all his life. In Japanese "Gaki" means kids, and "Zoshi" means in ancient Japanese a story.