Onibaba

Life's been tough, and you're surviving on the edge, trapping Samurai from flows in which you dredge, your often empty skillet, is sometimes, filled with millet, but at least your daughter in law helps you fetch. A neighbour returns home, with some bad news, your son, fallen in battle, no longer moves, it's not long before his wife, is causing stress, struggle and strife, behaving in a way you wholly disapprove. By fortune, you obtain a Hannya Mask, it comes in handy for a demonising task, a barrier of sorts, daughter in law's trips cut short, but there's no time to enjoy pleasures, or to bask.

Nobuko Otowa provides us with a truly outstanding performance as she grapples with her daughter in law's infidelity after the loss of her husband, leaving her isolated, alone and forgotten. The cinematography is sublime, the raw emotions unrefined, and the mask a cursed damnation that sticks and binds.

"Battle not with monsters, lest ye become a monster, and if you gaze into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you."

• Nietzsche

The characters in Onibaba dwell in the bottom rung of Maslow's Pyramid.

Food, sex, shelter, survival - though not necessarily in that order.

Sexuality permeates every frame of this film. It is ever-present along with the oppressive heat and the marshland weeds.

The stark black and white cinematography perfectly captures the desolate mood.

The score – atonal free jazz backed by tribal rhythms - though completely anachronistic works surprisingly well.

One of the most fiercely primal depictions of the human condition on celluloid, Onibaba is a hauntingly erotic masterpiece.

Wow,I saw this movie on Cable recently.Both of the women in this story are just trying their best to get by and survive in a bad situation.I could tell it was on a limited budget but very well written.It was erotic with frontal nudity and even filmed in the 60's.It had me on the edge of my seat the whole time.I was trying to figure out where they were going with the whole thing.I kept trying to decide if I sympathized with the old woman more than the young one.Then at the end I felt sorry for both of them.What a great story.This one needs to be on Cable more often.This one is a must see even for people who only like contemporary films.I would recommend it to anyone.

Director Kaneto Shindo's ONIBABA is a fantastic, rich, atmospheric horror film set in an amazing rural location. Its influence on decades of rural-set genre pics is undeniable.

In a medieval, warring Japan, a wild, young woman and her mother-in-law rob and kill lost samurai in order to survive. Problems begin when the younger woman becomes involved with an intended victim.

Staged in a rural world of tall, swaying grass and swollen rivers, the film contains little dialogue and little exposition. It relies heavily on the non-verbal performances of the female leads and the superbly conveyed location.

It is erotic, creepy, sensual, savage and beautiful.

Cinematic poetry.

Set during a very dark time of war,where weapons and food are the items of barter due to their scarceness, which sees two different Emperors on the throne of Japan and Kyoto destroyed by fire….our story is that of a Mother and her Daughter–in-law who have been left on their own to fend for themselves while the son/husband of our main protagonists is away at war….The Mother and daughter duo take care of themselves by killing any stray Samurai/warrior that passes their way and stripping them of their armour and weapons which they then trade for millet from the unscrupulous Ushi. One night Hachi a neighbour who had been at war with the missing Husband/son arrives at their hut in a very bedraggled state and tells them of his untimely death.The women are distraught…..Hachi has made his intentions clear he wants the daughter-in-Law as his woman……The Mother afraid of being left alone warns the daughter off ……….The ensuing drama is a tale of their sexual tension in the high summer heat, which is exemplified by the swaying of the reeds/grass, the faster the reeds blow in the wind the higher the sexual tension .The mother plays on the fears of the daughter by telling her tales of Demons who prey on those who do wrong….the wrong being sex outside of marriage, but this is just a smokescreen as the mother throws herself at Hachi and asks him to sleep with her…Hachi refuses, this is the final straw for the mother.The mother meets a Samurai General who is lost in the reeds, she kills him and takes the very scary Demon mask which he wore and wears it herself each night to scare the daughter when the daughter sneaks out for her nightly fix of lust with Hachi. This a very technically proficient film, not really a horror film until arguably the films last quarter…..it has surprisingly a lot of nudity which is not intrusive but is put there by Shindo to show that nudity is not really an issue for someone who has to kill every day just to survive. Shindo also uses Black and White to stunning effect at a time when it was probably easier to film in colour……..this is not a horror masterpiece……This is a Cinematic Masterpiece!