“Brechtian devices and the modern avant-garde merge in an icy, terrifying con-game based on a true incident in which a boy is forced by his parents to throw himself in the path of automobiles so they can blackmail the drivers. Cars and materialism are viewed as a part of a much deplored Americanization of Japan.” Amos Vogel
“(Oshima) has created a film of such depth and texture that this story...grows into an extraordinary experience, one in which the plight of the child becomes the plight of us all.... Oshima continually and purposely works against the grain, refusing himself any emotional, let alone sentimental gestures.... Further, Oshima refuses to avail himself of the symmetry which fables, as such, seem to demand. The form, rather, is organic, that demanded by character rather than plot. Open-ended sequences, visual nonsequiturs, lapses in continuity--all carefully judged--create the air of believability which this film so exudes. For a film to be this believable, it must also be this alive. From the very beginning...the sense of reality is brilliantly presented....” Donald Richie