This is an anguished,revealing film about the buraku minority in Japan which has faced discriminationfor centuries, and which recently has become a more visible focus for politicalactivism. Burakumin are those whose ancestors include butchers, leather workers,gravediggers, and others who performed tasks considered "unclean" byBuddhists or who provided services deemed lowly by the ruling classes. The story,taken from a controversial 1906 novel that became a classic of Japaneseliterature, concerns a young teacher (Raizo Ichikawa) in a small mountaincommunity who is torn between his father's dying commandment, "Hide youridentity as an outcast," and his sense of the injustice of the system.Painfully, his allegiance becomes diverted from his father to another figure ofrespect, a well-known author who has "come out" as an outcast.Cinematographer Kazuo Miyagawa's breathtaking compositions move from dark, bleakimagery to snow-covered mountains and forests as the story unfolds.