Nagisa Ōshima
16 titles · japanese contemporary
Two students run a badge scam on middle-aged men in Cruel Story of Youth, and the film has no interest in redeeming either of them. Postwar Japanese institutions are the target throughout: the state kills a Korean prisoner in Death by Hanging and he fails to die, so the officials re-enact the crime to remind him who he is. In the Realm of the Senses takes an obsessive affair to its documented end and was prosecuted for it.
Signature
- Direct assault on Japanese institutions and postwar consensus.
- Formal disruption: staged re-enactment, Brechtian distance, flat colour.
- Sexuality as political material.
- Protagonists the film declines to make sympathetic.
fit
In the Realm of the Senses
Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence
Death by Hanging
Cruel Story of Youth
Boy
The Ceremony
Violence at Noon
The Man Who Left His Will on Film
Pleasures of the Flesh
The Sun's Burial
Diary of a Shinjuku Thief
Sing a Song of Sex
Night and Fog in Japan
Japanese Summer: Double Suicide
Street of Love and Hope
Three Resurrected Drunkards
Street of Love and HopeCruel Story of YouthThe Sun's BurialNight and Fog in JapanPleasures of the FleshViolence at NoonSing a Song of SexJapanese Summer: Double SuicideDeath by HangingThree Resurrected DrunkardsBoyDiary of a Shinjuku ThiefThe Man Who Left His Will on FilmThe CeremonyIn the Realm of the SensesMerry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence