FILM REVIEWS

BALLAD OF NARAYAMA   – a Classic Film review Winner of several awards like the Palme d’Or in ’83, Grand Prize at the Cannes Film Festival and Japan Academy Prize for Picture of the Year ,  the Ballad of Narayama explores the legendary practice of obasute where out in an impoverished remote village in Northern Japan, the elderly, past the age of seventy, are carried up to Mount Nara to offer themselves to the God of the mountains. This practice is to make room for the next generation to survive on the meagre crops grown on their own fields. Written by Fukuzawa Shichiro and directed by Shohei Imamura in 1983, the second version of ‘Ballad of Narayama’ is a remake of the original version of the movie in 1958. It is the story of Mother Orin (Sumiko Sakamoto) and her family, trying to survive under extremely dismal life conditions in a village community in Japan. Orin is pragmatic but also a traditionalist who believes that her time is approaching to take the hike...