Kurosawa/Mizoguchi
Presented in 35mm
Saturday, March 25 | 5:30 pm
Rarely screened and still unavailable on home video, Kenji Mizoguchi’s aesthetically ravishing Utamaro and His Five Women was one of a handful of historical dramas produced under the American occupation of Japan following WWII. A lyrical, episodic biography of master Japanese woodblock painter and central “Floating World” figure Kitagawa Utamaro, the film is structured around the artist’s relationships with five of his female models. One of Mizoguchi’s most intimate, personal films, Utamaro and His Five Women is a luminous, wonderfully sensual evocation of the tumultuous relationship between inspiration and desire, and a trenchant critique of both artistic censorship and the subordinate position of women in Japanese society. Providing fascinating insights into the artistic and cultural dimensions of traditional, 18th-century Japanese painting, Utamaro and His Five Women is an ideal cinematic counterpart to After the Floating World: The Enduring Art of Japanese Woodblock Prints, currently on view at OKCMOA. Museum Films is thrilled to host a special, one-time presentation of Utamaro and His Five Women on 35mm.
Director Kenji Mizoguchi 1946 Japan 106 minutes NR 35mm
