Customer Reviews

Enjo [VHS]

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

"Enjo" is a great movie but it deserves to be released on DVD. The letterboxed image was very small on the screen, squashed into the 4:3 ratio box and not centered. It is skewed toward the top of the screen so if you zoom it you lose not only the subtitles but also part of the image as well. What was intolerable was the fact that the legend: "PROPERTY OF NEW YORKER VIDEO" kept appearing from time to time ON TOP OF THE IMAGE. At times it covered the faces of the actors! New Yorker Video proclaims on the box that Enjo is "One of the great masterpieces of Japanese cinema" so it is... why desecrate it in this way? It's like the burning of the temple in the film!

I hope that Criterion or Kino or some other company releases this film on DVD. DO NOT WASTE YOUR MONEY on this product. I paid $27 for this damaged, desecrated tape. Don't make the same mistake I did!

The previous review is by a person who's entirely missed the point of this film.


Enjo

Though this isn't really a samurai film, there are some yakuza elements involved, so I feel the film deserves mentioning. I do not understand why a company like Criterion hasn't leased the rights to release this film.

It was a real treat to see such a realistically filmed story with both Tatsuya Nakadai and Raizo Ichikawa. Despite this film having very little action -I usually cannot stand sitting through japanese or chinese films if there's not enough action- I was coached right along through a film of profound interest in human nature and sardonic humor. Raizo stutters and when his father dies is left to the master of a school who peruses the image of being an upright monk -though we see the contrary- who by Raizo's humble and unchecked honesty is won back over to the principles of uprightness -this takes the entire length of the story. Tatsuya plays a very sarcastic cripple who besides praying on women's sympathies for sexual companionship, deals in stolen goods, and loan sharking. Raizo befriends the philosophical Tatsuya identifying with one another because their both being outcasts and objects of humiliation in japanese society. Through it all Raizo's pure and true character even wins over the corrupt and bitter Tatsuya. The director Kon Ichikawa flows through this testimony of conflicting dishonest interests between people and their self centered contempt for those who are less fortunate around them seemlessly and spot on the mark with every scene. I'm talking flawless continuity here. Kon Ichikawa is a master craftsman. I've never seen any of his films that I'm aware of and I'm actually gonna put this flick in quite soon just get a clearer understanding of the story's concept.

There are some excellent quotes in the film. The dialogue in the story is profoundly thought out. One quote by Raizo who's rejecting his mothers attempt to live with him at the monastery and expressing his feelings about why he has a hard time talking to people, "When you learn your alone and live in despair then... words don't come easily." Another great quote by the priest of the monastery who being remonstrated by Raizo, who'd witnessed the priest visiting a brothal and stating he knows he (the priest) has been breaking his own vows, annoyed by this meddlesome neophyte the priest snaps back with, "So? knowing without understanding... means nothing!"

Tatsuya comes off as this Boris Karloff type character being severely crippled, yet who can still walk though most awkwardly, plays is role with matchless conviction.

An extremely realistic film, so much so, it's surreal.

5/5 an absolute must have for Raizo Ichikawa and Tatsuya Nakadai fans.

Fans of Ichikawa Kon's films will find this effort a complete waste of time. I often find Ichikawa's screen characters to be quite wooden, but in a good way. Watching "The Key" or even "Revenge of a Kabuki Actor," I enjoy the way that his characters tend to present themselves to each other without really making an impact on each other. His characters don't communicate as much as they make ritualistic revelations to each other, that fall, ultimately, on deaf ears (except for us in the audience). That his characters manage to have a meaningful rapport at all, is something momentary in his works. (The only exception to this rule is Ichikawa's fondness for Nakadai Tetsuya, who usually gets to register moments of shock or surprise in close-ups. Hey, he does it well...)

Watching this 1995 re-issue of the Mishima adaptation, I was utterly bored. Nothing happens in this movie. What does happen is ultimately off-screen and simply hinted at. If the actors here are blocks of wood, I wanted to see them burn up sooner. This almost seems like an exercise in minimalism for Ichikawa: how I can get people to sit in the same room, and not emote any feeling, and still, get the story elements to link together.

This film can be skipped. Instead, watch his superior "Revenge of a Kabuki Actor," "The Key," or "The Makioka Sisters."