The Face of Another

1966 Japanese drama

Rating: 16/20

Plot: Mr. Okuyama has been left with a badly disfigured face following an accident of some kind at his work place. Oh, snap! He feels a weighty loneliness, and his wife, although she claims none of her feelings have changed, refuses his sexual advances. He gets a psychiatrist to make him a very realistic mask so that he can once again be part of society and hopefully seduce his wife. The results are depressing as the mask seems to alter his psyche. To add to the fun, there's a parallel storyline involving a badly-scarred woman who seduces her brother and then kills herself. And the laughs just keep on coming!

This is something I'm going to have to see again. It moves slowly, but the imagery is strikingly horrific and surreal. Attention grabbed, you've still got to wade through a lot of philosophical/psychological dialogue, and I'm not sure if it was a language thing or just the fact that my mind is very small, but I got lost a few times. Intriguing themes--identity, different kinds of masks, freedom. It's like I fell into the existential deep-end but forgot my arm floaties. This is another Hiroshi Teshigahara film, and like Woman of the Dunes, one of the best movies I've seen this year, this has a unique style and completely breathtaking visuals. But it's heavy and it's ponderous, and therefore definitely not for everybody.