Review of Onibaba

Onibaba (1964)
8/10
I'd go to purgatory with you!
1 March 2009
Food and sex. Two things that are basic to human survival.

Amidst the tall reeds, both are sought and found in the eerie tale of war-torn Japan.

A mother (Nobuko Otowa) and daughter (Jitsuko Yoshimura) fight for survival by killing wandering samurai and throwing their bodies down a deep hole, selling their armor to a war profiteer (Taiji Tonoyama) for food.

Hachi (Kei Sato) returns from the war and has one thing on his mind - well, after he feeds his belly. Soon, the young woman is sneaking over to his hut. They are feeding their hunger everywhere, in the hut, in the reeds, even in a rainstorm, and the old woman is watching.

There is more nudity and sexual situations in this film than in any other Japanese film of the period that I have seen.

The old woman is desperate to split up Hachi and her daughter-in-law, and is aided by the sudden appearance of a samurai in a demon mask.

She dispatches the samurai in the usual manner and uses the demon mask to scare her daughter-in-law away from Hachi. Unfortunately for her, the plan backfires.

Great cinematography and exciting suspense.
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