Few films transformed the landscape of Japanese cinema-both at home and abroad-like Kaneto Shindo's mesmerizing Naked Island, “one of the most beautiful cinematic poems the Japanese cinema has given us” (Pariscope). Filmed with a minuscule cast and crew on a nearly deserted, windswept archipelago in southwest Japan, the film chronicles the harsh daily struggle of a family of farmers against winds, land, sun, and even fate. Matching the island itself, Shindo stripped the film down to bare essentials: no words and little conventional “plot,” but a dramatic embrace of natural sound recording and, most of all, a widescreen 'scope format that turns every move and motion-whether human or in nature-into epic poetry. Shindo abandoned the studio system to make this film with his independent production company; its international success saved the company (and the director) from bankruptcy, and proved that independent film in Japan could succeed.