Woman in the Dunes
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| Woman in the Dunes | |
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 Japanese theatrical poster |
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| Directed by | Hiroshi Teshigahara |
| Produced by | Kiichi Ichikawa Tadashi Oono |
| Written by | Kōbō Abe |
| Starring | Eiji Okada Kyoko Kishida |
| Music by | Tōru Takemitsu |
| Cinematography | Hiroshi Segawa |
| Editing by | Fusako Shuzui |
| Distributed by | Toho |
| Release date(s) | February 15, 1964 (Japan) October 25, 1964 (USA) |
| Running time | 123 min 147 min (director's cut) |
| Country | Japan |
| Language | Japanese |
Woman in the Dunes (砂の女 Suna no onna, also translated as Woman of the Dunes) is a novel by Kōbō Abe and a film based on the novel directed by Hiroshi Teshigahara. The novel was published in 1962, and the film was released in 1964. Kōbō Abe also wrote the screenplay for the film version.
The surreal and, at times, absurd nature of Woman in the Dunes has been compared to existentialist works such as Sartre's No Exit and Beckett's Happy Days. Aside from its intriguing premise, this film is notable for the life that Teshigahara brings to the ever shifting sand, which almost becomes a character in its own right.
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[edit] Synopsis
An entomologist named Junpei Niki (played in the film by Eiji Okada) is on an expedition to collect insects in an area of sand dunes. When he misses the last bus back, a group of locals suggest that he stay the night in their village. They send him down a rope ladder to a house at the bottom of a sandpit, where a young widow (played by Kyoko Kishida) lives alone. She has been tasked by the villagers with digging sand to be sold to the cities, mostly under the table (sand with salt should not be used for construction purposes), and with preventing the sands from destroying the house (if her house succumbs to the desert then the other houses in the village will be threatened).
When Junpei tries to leave the next morning, he finds the ladder removed. The villagers inform him that he must help the widow in her endless task of digging sand. Junpei initially tries to escape; upon failing he takes the widow captive but is forced to release her in order to receive water from the villagers.
Junpei eventually becomes the widow's lover and resigns himself to his fate. Through his persistent effort to trap a crow as a messenger, he discovers a way to draw water from the damp sand at night. He thus becomes absorbed in the task of perfecting his technology and adapts to his "trapped" life. The focus of the film shifts to the way in which the couple cope with the oppressiveness of their condition, and the power of their physical attraction in spite of— or possibly because of— their situation.
At the end of the film Junpei gets his chance to escape, but he chooses to prolong his stay in the dune, in part because the woman is already pregnant with his child. A report after seven years declaring him missing is then shown hanging from a wall, written by the police and signed by his mother Shino.
[edit] Cast
- Eiji Okada - Entomologist Niki Jumpei
- Kyôko Kishida - Woman
- Hiroko Ito - Entomologist's wife (in flashbacks)
- Koji Mitsui
- Sen Yano
- Kinzo Sekiguchi
[edit] Awards
The film adaptation of Woman in the Dunes won the Special Jury Prize at the 1964 Cannes Film Festival[1] and, somewhat unusually for an avant-garde film, was nominated for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar in the same year (losing out to Italian film Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow). In 1965, Teshigahara was nominated for the Best Director Oscar (losing to Robert Wise for The Sound of Music).
[edit] References
- ^ "Festival de Cannes: Woman in the Dunes". festival-cannes.com. http://www.festival-cannes.com/en/archives/ficheFilm/id/3062/year/1964.html. Retrieved 2009-02-28.
[edit] External links
- Woman in the Dunes at the Internet Movie Database
- Woman in the Dunes at Allmovie
- Woman in the Dunes essay by Roger Ebert
- Woman in the Dunes at Strictly Film School
- (Japanese) Woman in the Dunes at the Japanese Movie Database
- Woman in the Dunes at Rotten Tomatoes
| Preceded by Harakiri tied with The Cassandra Cat |
Special Jury Prize, Cannes 1964 |
Succeeded by Kwaidan |
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