Seppuku (1962)

Note des utilisateurs:

8.1/10   

Réalisateur:

Masaki Kobayashi

Writers:

Shinobu Hashimoto (writer)
Yasuhiko Takiguchi (story)

Release Date:

4 août 1964 (USA)

Genre:

Drame

Plot:

Peace in 17th-century Japan causes the Shogunate's breakup of warrior clans, throwing thousands of samurai out of work and into poverty...

Plot Keywords:

Samurai | Hara Kiri | Revenge | Poverty | Suicide

Awards:

8 wins & 1 nomination

Avis des utilisateurs:

Touching and tough provoking masterpiece.

Ensemble

Tatsuya Nakadai	...	Hanshiro Tsugumo
Rentaro Mikuni	...	Kageyu Saito
Shima Iwashita	...	Miho Tsugumo
Akira Ishihama	...	Motome Chijiiwa
reste de la distribution par ordre alphabétique:
Shichisaburo Amatsu	...	Retainer
Yoshio Aoki	...	Umenosuke Kawabe
Jo Azumi	...	Ichiro Shimmen
Hisashi Igawa	...	Retainer
Yoshio Inaba	...	Jinai Chijiiwa
Akiji Kobayashi		(as Shôji Kobayashi)
Masao Mishima	...	Tango Inaba
Ichirô Nakaya	...	Hayato Yazaki
Kei Sato	...	Masakazu
Ryo Takeuchi	...	Retainer
Tetsuro Tamba	...	Hikokuro Omodaka

Réalisé par
Masaki Kobayashi

Scénaristes (in alphabetical order)
Shinobu Hashimoto		writer
Yasuhiko Takiguchi		story

Produit par
Tatsuo Hosoya	....	producer

Musique originale
Tôru Takemitsu

Image
Yoshio Miyajima

Montage
Hisashi Sagara

Création des décors
Junichi Ozumi
Jusho Toda		(as Shigemasa Toda)

Production Companies

• Shochiku Kinema Kenkyû-jo

Distributors

• Shochiku Kinema Kenkyû-jo (1962) (Japan) (theatrical)
• Signal International (1964) (USA) (theatrical) (subtitled)
• Criterion Collection, The (2005) (USA) (DVD)
• Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) (1975) (USA) (TV) (network premiere)
• Japanski Sinemaskop (1964) (Yugoslavia) (theatrical)
• Svensk Filmindustri (SF) (1965) (Sweden) (theatrical)

Autre(s) titre(s):

Harakiri (USA)
Hara-kiri (France) [fr]

Durée:

133 min

Pays:

Japan

Langue:

Japonais

Couleur:

Noir et Blanc

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Son:

Mono

Classification:

UK:X | France:U | Argentina:16 | Finland:K-16 | Sweden:15

Company:

Shochiku Kinema Kenkyû-jo

Anecdotes:

Stage-trained actor Tatsuya Nakadai and older film actor Rentaro Mikuni could not agree on an acceptable speaking voice while sharing the film stage. Nakadai spoke loudly and Mikuni spoke softly each citing their related acting experiences for their choice. They strongly disagreed with each other. The director, Masaki Kobayashi, halted filming and stated that he would not resume until both the actors came to an agreement. They did; stopping the shooting for three days!

Guillemet:

Hanshiro Tsugumo: After all, this thing we call samurai honor is ultimately nothing but a facade.

Touching and tough provoking masterpiece.

Seppuku or harakiri is a samurai ritual where an elderly samurai cuts his belly open with a small sword and makes a cross in his flesh. After cutting other samurai cuts his head of to end the pain. And like this a samurai will die honorably.

Seppuku tells a story of one elderly samurai named Hanshiro Tsugumo who has lots of things to tell before his harakiri. He tells a story about his beautiful daughter and her life. You can tell that the other samurais aren't actually very pleased with his story telling because the man just doesn't know when to stop. When Hanshiro finally finishes his stories there won't be his harakiri. No, then a great battle will begin.

The influence of Seppuku in modern cinema is obvious. The final battle sequence is lot like in Kill Bill vol.1. And that's not the only thing that is similar to some movies of this date.

Tatsuya Nakadai does great job in Hanshiro's role and the rest of the cast aren't bad either. Visual aspects of Seppuku are beautiful and the movie itself is very tough provoking. Well it's hard for me to put all into words because of the language barrier but I'll just say this: Seppuku is amazingly deep and beautiful movie which criticizes the mindless samurai ritual they call harakiri. I'm sorry I can't say much - after all I am young and Finish so English doesn't come so naturally for me. But It's easy for me to say - go and watch Seppuku, it's truly a great movie.

Now it's time for me to watch other movies of Masaki Kobayashi.