Another complex tale of a “simple” woman who, like Tome in The Insect Woman, has nothing in the world except an indominable instinct for survival. Sadako was raised as a maid in the household of her husband, who continues to treat her as a serf, refusing her a place in his family registry and denying their son his parentage. While the husband is away, Sadako is raped--an act that jars loose long-repressed memories of childhood sexuality and precipitates an awareness of her somnambulistic, bovine existence as an adult. A bizarre relationship develops between the rapist, who continues to stalk the frightened woman with both tender and violent professions of love, and Sadako, whose intentions to murder the rapist lead to a remarkable denouement. Imamura's “explosive” style introduces slow motion, extreme close-ups and hand-held cameras where they are least expected, allowing him his distanced, atypical view of violence and sensuality. As critic Joan Mellen writes, “Imamura's belief in the basic irrationality of human existence is nowhere better expressed than in the fact that it took a brutal rape to release this woman's strength.”

Japanese film specialist David Owens is Film Program Coordinator at the Japan Society, New York.