Ugetsu (1953, dir. Kenji Mizoguchi, Japan) by Patrick McElroy

“It was only when I passed 40, that I understood the human truths I want to express in my films” are the words said by master filmmaker Kenji Mizoguchi. We live in a culture that’s casually ageist, and always emphasizes youth, but what we end up rejecting is the wisdom of years.

40 was just the beginning of a new era for Mizoguchi, but it was when he was 55 that he achieved what many consider his finest film – Ugetsu – which turns 70 this month, and much like Mizoguchi, it reveals deeper meaning with age.

The film is based on two stories by writer Ueda Akinari, The House in the Thicket, and The Lust of the White Serpent, combining history and fable. The film takes place during Japan’s civil war in the 16th century and is set in a farming village in Lake Biwa.

The film’s main protagonist is Genjuro, a potter, who has a wife and a son, and the other protagonist is his brother-in-law Tobei – also married, who dreams of being a samurai. The war causes these two men to leave their homes, and head across the lake to the market.

There, Genjuro is seduced by a wealthy woman who might be a spirit, and Tobei is seduced into the pride and glory of being a samurai. The rest of the story unfolds in tragedy and poetry, showing how men sacrifice their wives and families for pleasure and material.

What’s remarkable about  Mizoguchi is the quietness of his films, in an age where there’s so much loud noise in films, he keeps it silent to create a haunting atmosphere. Much has been written about his camera moves,  but some of his static shots are just as impressive. In several of them he shows land, water, and sky creating multiple layers. His films are complex with emotion, but simple in their storytelling. 

One of the most notable influences on the film is F.W. Murnau’s 1927 landmark masterpiece Sunrise. In that film, set in America, a married farmer is tempted by a sumptuous woman and material life in the city similar to Genjuro’s ark. Both films also feature a nighttime  sequence on a boat, with shadows and fog.

When Ugetsu was first released it was credited as one of the films, along with Kurosawa’s Rashomon, that introduced the world to Japanese cinema. It would instantly be acclaimed, earning an Oscar nomination for its costume design, and being the rare film that pleased both Pauline Kael,and Andrew Sarris, who often had their disagreements on taste and film theory.

Since 1962, every ten years it has appeared on every Sight and Sound top 100. In 2008 the French film publication Cahiers du Cinema made a top 100 greatest films list, and Ugetsu ranked at number #16. The film was one of the favorites of Jean-Luc Godard who called it “Mizoguchi's masterpiece, and one which ranks him on equal terms with Griffith, Eisenstein, and Renoir.”

Godard’s fellow French new wave filmmaker Eric Rohmer was also a fan of the film. He took thematic influence from it for a series of films he made from the 60s into the early 70s that he titled “Six Moral Tales”, each film dealing with a man tempted by a more vivacious woman, versus the moral one they’re already with.

In 2012 and 2022 Martin  Scorsese made separate lists of his favorite films for Sight and Sound, and he included Ugetsu in both of them. His Film Foundation would restore the film in 2016. When looking at this movie in 2023 you feel a sense of mastery that’s lacking in modern movies, where many of them feel like  filmed screenplays. Hopefully more future filmmakers can see films like Ugetsu and return to that form of visual storytelling, as it had on the generation when it was first released.

Patrick McElroy is a movie writer and movie lover based in Los Angeles. Check out his other writing at: https://www.facebook.com/patrick.mcelroy.3726 or his IG: @mcelroy.patrick