Most lovers of cinema have heard of the masterful Akira Kurosawa - or at least of his famous Seven Samurai - but this countryman of his, Kenji Mizoguchi, deserves some attention too.
I don't remember how I discovered his work and I've only seen 3 or 4 of his films but they were all great. Today I want to point you to a movie titled:
Ugetsu Monogatari, also known as Ghost Story.
If I need to believe my movie journal, I watched this film in two parts - something I hate to do - with a four day gap in between. I must have had a good reason for that. It's very unusual for me. Nevertheless, I liked it immensely.
This is what I wrote down about it, freely translated from Dutch:
Masterful film, that smoothly changes genres. Good actors, strong story. Full of drama, humor and suspense. The level of Kurosawa but with half the run time (of his films).
Now here's the trailer:
I highly recommend you to go see this if you can. I just realized that it's 65 years old, as is my mom.
Sorry for revealing this 'secret' mom! I know you will be reading this soon.*
Other movies by Mizoguchi that I suggest you watch some day are:
Sansho the Bailiff (1954)
Street of Shame (1956)
The latter is a film on prostitution, told from the point of view of the prostitutes. It was the very last production by Mizoguchi. He died shortly after its release.
