WOMAN OF THE DUNES
Japan, 1964, 124 minutes, Black and white.
Eijy Okada, Kyoko Kishida.
Directed by Hiroshi Teshigahara.
Woman of the Dunes is considered a classic Japanese film from the 60s, nominated for Oscar for best foreign film as well as for best director (the first Asian director to be nominated).
The film is striking in its black and white photography, especially the winds and the sands of the dunes on the Japanese coast. The story, in many ways, is simple: a teacher who has collected specimens of insects doesn't reach his bus home and is offered shelter at the bottom of a sandpit. A young widow lives there. He then realises that the rope ladder has been taken away and that he is trapped. He helps the woman shovelling the sand away which would cover her house, and this is repeated day by day. The villagers sometimes bring food and water. As the time goes past, he feels the pressure of his imprisonment, attempts an escape, has a sexual relationship with the woman who gradually mellows after being courteous to him and comes to rely on him. When he is returned after his escape, he accepts his condition, finding a means of producing a small reservoir of water which becomes his obsession. Finally, when the woman has pregnancy pains and is taken to the doctor, the rope ladder is there, he goes to look at the sea but returns and the film, at the end, offers documents to say that he is a missing person.
The film is intense in its portrait of the man and the woman, their relationship and dependency, the malice of the people from the village (especially wanting to be voyeurs of his sexual relationship with the woman, which they refuse). The film also serves as an image of the human condition, people wanting freedom, but eventually succumbing to their comfort zone.
1. The impact of the film, in its time? Oscar nominations?
2. The work of the director, his background as an artist, potter, flower arranger? The artistic style of his compositions, each frame, visual patterns, the winds and the sand? The angle photography, light and shadow?
3. The title and the focus on the woman, the film and its focus on the man?
4. The dunes, the coast, the ocean? The sand on the shore, the dunes, the winds, the striations on the sand? Night and day? The sand and its collapsing? The man trying to get out? The angle of the villagers watching the man and the woman, the house and the pit? The atmospheric musical score – more modern atonal and with mixed styles?
5. The portrait of the man: his collecting the specimens, his enjoyment of his time at the beach, the teacher and his leave? Missing the last bus, the darkness, the old man offering him the hospitality of the house, his climbing down? The woman, treating him as a guest, their not being enough water for a bath? The meals? The rope ladder missing? His hope to get out, the gradual realisation of his imprisonment? The discussions with the woman, shovelling the sand away from the house? His weariness? The lack of water, his growing desperation, trying to climb out? The lowering of the water, his greedy drinking of it? The days passing, the relationship with the woman, the sexual relationship? His hoping that people would miss him, his telling her about his desk, the open book, his documents? Nobody coming to find him? The months passing? The work on the sand? His attempted escape, his device in knotting the cloths, getting the woman drunk, climbing on the roof, getting out?
6. The night, his being lost in the dunes, seeing the lamps, the village people and their putting him back again? His gradual acceptance of the situation? His judgment on the immorality of the salted sand and its potential for the destruction of homes? The woman’s indifference? The village people wanting to observe the sexual encounter, his attacking the woman, telling her to pretend, her refusal? The pains, their coming down, taking her to the doctor, leaving the rope ladder? His getting out, the exhilaration of watching the beach? The water? The fact that he had discovered how to get a small reservoir of water, the physics of it, the mechanism? That becoming his obsession, his coming back, realising he could escape at another time?
7. The woman, widow, her husband and daughter dead? Her accepting her plight, the house and its comforts, the shovelling of the sand? Treating the man as a guest? The meals, the hospitality, the eventual sexual relationship? Her resistance to the voyeurism of the village people? The discussions with the man? Her pregnancy pains, her being taken to hospital?
8. The people from the village, the old man tricking the teacher to go down to the house? The people bringing the supplies, withdrawing them? Bringing the man back after his escape? The lewd gathering, the masks, the leering? The treatment of the woman, taking her to the doctor?
9. The imagery of the film, the sand and the dunes, the wind sweeping them away, losing track of people? The imprisonment? The image of the imprisonment as a metaphor for the hardships of the human condition?
