Kwaidan is the type of film that deals with older, simpler forms of storytelling, but manages to craft a unique style and presentation that not only works for the stories that it tells, but also enhances their effect and takes the audience into a new place that is artificial yet incredibly striking and hauntingly ominous. I’d almost describe it as being like a series of plays that have been retooled with cinematic enhancements, which I get the feeling is what they were going for. I’ll get more into this later, as I always do, but needless to say I was rather impressed with this film, though I do acknowledge that you might have to be in the right state of mind to watch it. Let’s go over a brief synopsis of each story.
The first story, The Black Hair, concerns a lower-class swordsman leaving his wife (and life) behind to marry a higher-class woman in order to move up in the world. This marriage, however, is nowhere near as loving as the one he had before, and he often finds himself thinking back to the past and his former wife, longing for what he had so carelessly given up. This culminates in a reunion with his wife several years later when he returns to his now disheveled home. The second story, The Woman of the Snow, tells of two woodcutters who take shelter in an oarsman’s cabin during a blizzard. The titular woman drains the life out of the older woodcutter but spares the younger one out of pity for his young age. However, she warns him to never tell a soul about what happened that night, not even the charming wife he eventually marries. The third story, Hoichi the Earless, recounts the events involving a young, blind biwa player who sings of an old battle between two rival clans. A samurai comes to Hoichi in the night and leads Hoichi to his lord, who has asked the boy to play and sing of the struggle. This keeps happening consistently to the point where the priest and his assistants (who live in the same temple that Hoichi does) become very concerned, especially after they figure out where the samurai has been taking Hoichi all this time. The fourth and final story, In a Cup of Tea, is an unfinished one that concerns a lord’s assistant who sees the reflection of a man named Heinai Shikibu in water and is later visited by said man’s attendants who he promptly tries to attack, as well as the author himself who seemed to disappear before completing the story under mysterious circumstances. This plot section isn’t as long as some of the other ones, I know, but when you’re dealing with four short stories in succession, they’re most likely going to be short descriptions, especially if you don’t want to reveal the endings for anyone.
From the word go, I could tell that the film was emulating traditional Japanese theater, especially the Noh theatre variety, which was often very slow, dramatic, and usually involved supernatural elements. All of these aspects are in this film, but it goes an extra step further in its theater inspiration by having several of the filming sets look blatantly artificial. In the third story, the ancient battle that Hoichi sings of is clearly being filmed on a water stage, but the lack of depth that still somehow feels big and epic almost gives off the impression of a painting coming to life, which is reinforced by a painting of the battle they keep showing while the scene is playing. In the second story, you can clearly tell that the snowy forest with sparse trees ends with a wall in the background that’s painted to look like the sky, but the visual it creates, complete with clouds shaped like eyes, is so striking and ominous that you buy into it as representational rather than realistic. And that’s a key word here: ominous. This whole film creates and is able to maintain an atmosphere of omen that always sits right under the surface until you finally see what the ultimate reveal is. I feel as though they pulled this off with a few different aspects: the sparse music, mostly performed by singular drumbeats which ramp up during certain times of action. The slow pace, which lulls the viewer into a state of unease and curiosity at what is going on and what will occur. And finally, the eerie ghostly elements of the stories, which lend the film a feeling of otherworldliness and a classic campfire-esque fear of the idea that maybe, just maybe, these things did/could happen. The use of color and makeup are also quite stunning in this film. In the second story, chunks of stark red and blue are contrasted against a bright, white, and snowy background, really allowing them to pop. In addition, when the Lady of the Snow appears, the entire scene becomes covered in a cold, blue light, to the point where even our main character’s skin looks blue (which I’m not sure if it’s just part of the lighting or if there’s added makeup, but either way, it’s effective). This not only gives off the impression of the lady’s power and influence, but also an impending cold death for our hero and makes us just as afraid as he is. The makeup, on the other hand, is either used in the more traditional Japanese way of pale white faces with drawn-on eyebrows (which can be effectively ghostly on some characters, though I’m not sure if that was specifically the point) or as a way to show a change or transformation. This technique can be seen most prominently in the first and third stories. The first is a bit trickier to talk about, as I want to avoid spoilers, but I’ll just say that you see a character gradually age with every jump-cut in one scene, and it really ties into the theme of giving up on one life for another and the repercussions of facing said life you abandoned before. The third story, on the other hand, uses this makeup transformation idea in a slightly different way. The more and more Hoichi is taken to the lord’s domain, the more and more his face becomes ghostly/demonic, which is shown through applications of gray and black makeup that give his face a dour yet threatening look. In general, I feel that they did a very good job on the visual and presentational aspects of the film and crafted an interesting vision that elevated the simple yet classic stories into a more engaging experience than they might have been otherwise. I even think that the rather played-up acting aided this overall composition, as it fit very well within the pseudo-theater aesthetic and the heavily stylized look. I’ve found that this sort of “played-up” delivery is a common factor in a lot of Japanese media, and it’s something that doesn’t always resonate with me for whatever reason, but I felt that it was rather fitting in this case and managed to aid the experience more than hinder it.
So, overall, I found this to be a very well-executed film that knew exactly what it wanted to accomplish and did so in a fascinating and engaging way. I will say though that, due to the slower pace of this film as well as the three-hour runtime, you might need to be in the right frame of mind in order to view it. This is the sort of film that you need to ease into and allow to envelop you in its atmosphere, and probably take advantage of the intermission that they were kind enough to put in. But if you’re ready for that sort of experience, then sit back, relax, and enjoy tonight’s presentation of the ancient tales of Kwaidan.