Histoire de fantômes japonais

Great film -- very compelling, entertaining and thought provoking.

My wonderful girlfriend somewhat randomly picked this up from at the video rental -- excellent film, very interesting story and very well presented. Really liked the character development and camera work -- angles were great and simple film editing (1959) created some excellent special effects.

A classic ghost story with a very clear moral message -- if you double deal on your wife, she will get ugly on you.

This excellent Japanese ghost flick is a perfect illustration of how the 90s J-horror cycle was rooted in a long Japanese cinematic tradition (and ancient folkloric tradition) of murdered women who hold serious postmortem grudges.

The first half of Tokaido Yotsuya Kaidan shows the antagonists' increasingly shocking moral depravity as it gathers momentum and raise the foundation for the second part of the movie. This second part consists of the revenge of the wrong spirit. It is equally shocking, gruesome, and horrifying. The production design is sumptuous, with striking use of color and sound, with a score that punctuates each shocking moment.

Easily one of the best Japanese horror movies ever made, and one that should be at the top of every list of top ghost story flicks.

Fast summery of the movie, it's about a samurai who wants a woman as his wife, Doea the unthinkable and then does it again.

It's a good plot and great acting in it. And the scenes are very good! Specially the final part and the scenes and how it's filmed are really nice. The last part of this movie really made the movie shine and it was really good stuff.

It's a good revenge movie, the main villians you really hope to die as mercyless and themselves were. I liked this movie a lot, even though I was sitting after half the movie wondering were the ghost stuff were suppose to happen and man didn't i have to wait long.

All in all, great horror movie.

The Ghost of Yotsuya is yet another adaptation of the timeless Japanese ghost story Yotsuya Kaidan. The trouble is there are so immensely many movies telling exactly the same story with few deviations from the source material.

Sadly truth be told I don't like the story, other than being overplayed it's just not all that interesting and I think Japan has considerably better ghost stories than this.

For those unaware it tells the story of a samurai who poisons his wife to further his deviant plans. She however returns from the grave and haunts him, gradually chipping away at his psyche until he's a broken wreck of a man.

Despite my average rating I think this is the best adaptation made replacing Illusion of Blood (1965). It plays out the horror well, the lead does his role competently and it all flows better than most (Partially due to the suitable running time).

For anyone who hasn't seen Yotsuya Kaidan on screen before I'd recommend this one. If however you have then perhaps skip this and the others as they are near carbon copies of one another.

The Good:

Manages the horror element well

Competent lead

The Bad:

Same old story

This film essentially begins with a young samurai by the name of "Iemon Tamiya" (Shigeru Amachi) asking a more high-level samurai named "Samon Yotsuya" (Shinjiro Asano) to marry his daughter "Iwa Yotsuya). In response, Samon angrily refuses because he considers Iemon to be much too hedonistic and of low-moral character. Not surprisingly, this infuriates Iemon and, as if to prove Samon's point-he furiously draws his sword and kills the older man on the spot. Having witnessed the murder and wanting to capitalize on it, a cunning peasant named "Naosuke" (Shuntaro Emi) appears from the shadows and advises Iemon on exactly what to do next. Needless to say, Iemon listens quite intensely and in relatively little time he does, in fact, marry Iwa. Likewise, Naosuke also gets closer to realizing his ambition of marrying Iwa's sister "Sode" (Noriko Kitazawa) who was always out of reach for him due to his low status in life. However, what neither Iemon or Naosuke realize is that, eventually, their evil deeds will catch up to them--and when they do--they come in a most bizarre manner. Now, rather than reveal any more, I will just say that this was a good horror film which took a bit of time laying down the foundation of the story before really increasing in intensity later on. Admittedly, the costumes and makeup used pale in comparison to the CGI and special effects found in more modern films of today. No question about it. But even so, I thought that the overall movie was still quite entertaining, and I have rated it accordingly.