WILLIAM FLANIGAN Viewed on DVD. Subtitles = one (1) star. A pot boiler with sumptuous production values. Exterior location and interior sets look/are authentic. The kimonos are stunning. Acting, direction, and cinematography are close to (if not) first rate. Authentic Western Japan dialect (now and then). That's the good stuff. Now the rest. If you were native-born Japanese and lacked English language conversational skills (more and more a rarity today), imagine how, say, a BBC soap opera would come across based on subtitles? Without being able to catch and enjoy much in the way of acting nuances, subplots, etc., would it appear to be just plain tedious, repetitious, and boring? Probably. Also an apt description of this Criterion disc version: it's tedious, repetitious, and boring. The subtitles are vacuous and often incorrect. The disc cries out for extensive supplemental material on what the film is about, the culture it recreates, the author of the source material, backgrounds on the director and lead actresses, etc. If you lack Japanese conversational skills, work on your Japanese, and then re-visit the film in a few years. You might be amazed at how much it has "improved"! Except for the cheap synthesized music. WILLIAM FLANIGAN, PhD.

Michael Neumann This elegant domestic drama unfortunately offers little to viewers not already attracted to Japanese culture and tradition. The writing is sensitive; the photography is beautiful; but once the plot lines are clear don't expect many surprises.The story involves a pair of formality-bound wives attempting to uphold etiquette by arranging marriages for their more modern (and thus less willing) younger sisters. And because the film is set during the halcyon days just prior to World War Two, it presumably ends with an elegiac parting glance at the passing of a more refined age.Postscript: the all-too brief impressions above were gleaned from a single, incomplete screening during the film's brief theatrical run at the Opera Plaza Cinema complex in San Franscisco, way back in 1986 (three years later, I would be in the same small theater when the Loma Prieta earthquake hit). Now (certainly) older and (possibly) wiser, I would like the chance to re-evaluate it...

weegeeworld I give this film 10 out of 10 as even after seeing it more than 10 times it still moves me deeply. I was 15 years old when I first saw this movie in the theater in Seattle. I went back to see it again a couple of weeks later. The first 13 minutes during the credits is my favorite scene, filmed in Kyoto in Springtime. Read the book for more background. The Kimono worn by the female actresses are amazing. The late Juzo Itami plays the father. All the dialog is spoken in "Osaka-ben" or Osaka dialect, which has a softer sound than Tokyo dialect. You can also hear some Kyoto-ben too ("gomen-yasu" said by a servant upon entering in the first scene before entering the room). This film brings me to tears it is so beautiful. At the end of the first scene, when the camera pans out to the cherry blossoms outside and the music starts...it is cinematic heaven! I am waiting for this film to come out on DVD.

MartinHafer This is a gorgeous film to watch--you probably will never see a more beautiful view of Japan as you see of the wonderful cherry blossoms or Japanese Maples around Kyoto and Osaka. So, the cinematography is excellent. However, the story itself seemed awfully flat overall. The writing and acting was decent, but the film needed more energy, heart and a sense of humor for me to care more about the characters. Most of the characters would have surely benefited from a massive dose of this, as the way they were portrayed it was, at times, hard to for me to care about them or sustain my interest in the film. For example, the 3rd daughter (who was the one who repeatedly refused marriage proposals) was a bit of a cipher, as she didn't say very much and just used a lot of facial expressions instead of dialog. The youngest, though a little self-destructive, was probably the easiest to like or at least understand. And the two older sisters were very domineering but needed to be softened a little more--lest they seem too one-dimensional. A decent film, but that's all.