After great pain: The uses of religious folklore in Kenji Mizoguchi’s SANSHO THE BAILIFF (JP 1954) and Kaneto Shindo’s ONIBABA (JP 1964)

• Main Author: NG, Teng-kuan
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University 2023
• Subjects: Buddhism and Film; Japanese Cinema; Kaneto Shindo; Kenji Mizoguchi; Onibaba; Religious Folklore; Sansho the Bailiff; Asian Studies; Film and Media Studies; Religion
• Online Access: https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/cis_research/141; https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/context/cis_research/article/1140/viewcontent/Ng__Teng_Kuan_After_Great_Pain_pvoa_cc_by_nc.pdf
• Institution: Singapore Management University

This article studies the adaptations and applications of religious folklore in two mas-terworks of Japanese cinema: Kenji Mizoguchi’s Sansho Dayu (Sansho the Bailiff, JP 1954) and Kaneto Shindo’s Onibaba (JP 1964). While academic approaches will often draw a strict line between narrative genres and discursive forms, these films, I argue, draw creatively from Japanese tradition for both critical and constructive purposes in the postwar context. Besides mounting trenchant criticisms of Japan’s erstwhile militaristic violence and imperial ambitions, both filmmakers present their respective female protagonists as models for spiritual and sociocultural transformation in the face of anomie. Embodying humanistic compassion on the one hand and ontogenetic eros on the other, the two women compose complementary poles for reconstruction amidst the painful aftermath of war.