Double Suicide [Criterion Collection]

Director: Masahiro Shinoda Masahiro Shinoda

Overview

Masahiro Shinoda's classic Japanese film Double Suicide comes to DVD with a standard full-frame transfer. The Japanese soundtrack is rendered in Dolby Digital Mono. English subtitles are accessible. There are no supplemental materials of any consequence, but this is still a worthwhile disc from Criterion for any fan of international cinema.

Product Details

Release Date:	01/30/2001
UPC:	0037429149621
Original Release:	1969
Source:	Criterion Collection
Region Code:	1
Sound:	[Dolby Digital Mono]
Language:	English
Time:	1:44:00
Sales rank:	19,329

Cast & Crew

Performance Credits

Kichiemon Nakamura (2nd)	Jihei
Shima Iwashita	Koharu / Osan
Hosei Komatsu	Tahei
Yusuke Takita	Magoemon
Kamatari Fujiwara	Yamatoya Owner
Yoshi Kato	Gosaemon
Shizue Kawarazaki	Osan's Mother
Tokie Hidari	Osugi
Tôru Takemitsu	Composer

Technical Credits

Masahiro Shinoda

Tôru Takemitsu

Taeko Tomioka

Masahiro Shinoda	Director,Producer,Screenwriter
Masayuki Nakajima	Producer
Tôru Takemitsu	Screenwriter
Taeko Tomioka	Screenwriter

Scene Index

Side #1 --
1. Logos [:14]
2. Essential Images/Opening Titles [4:50]
3. Fate [2:06]
4. The Pleasure Quarters [6:10]
5. The Sound of Gold [6:06]
6. "Let's Have Sake and Cheer Up" [8:01]
7. Ruffian With a Sword [3:59]
8. "Cheating Is a Whore's Job" [5:58]
9. A Paper Shop of Good Repute [4:11]
10. Lazy Worm [10:09]
11. "Are You Crying?" [11:16]
12. Silk for Redemption [5:17]
13. Letter of Divorce [6:56]
14. Paper Walls [2:59]
15. Safehouse [7:26]
16. Bound by Duty [4:58]
17. Priest and Nun [6:47]
18. Double Suicide [6:03]

Menu

Side #1 --
   Play the Movie
   Chapters
   Subtitles
      On
      Off
   Color Bars

Editorial Reviews

Yasujiro Ozu, the Japanese master who's usually pegged as a gentle, transcendental gazer, here serves up an efficient, materially rich peek at everyday (circa 1959) rituals and conversations. Set in a Tokyo suburb replete with Americanisms -- washing machines, atomically bright sweaters and blue jeans, a hula hoop, a guitar-and-marimba score, kids piping up with English idioms -- this minimalist comedy mainly concerns two nearly identically dressed brothers who refuse to talk until their father buys a television set for their household. The brothers -- one a hard-eyed rebel and the other a pipsqueak who echoes his elder's sentiments -- shake up the world around them by pointing out its hypocrisies. Visually austere (there isn't a single moving shot in the entire film) yet complex in its machinations, Good Morning's witty dissection of manners ostensibly remakes Ozu's silent 1932 film I Was Born, But…. in color and sound. The soundtrack is particularly rich, especially in the delicate way it makes a pumice-fueled farting contest a pivotal and dignified springboard for comic nuance.

Barnes & Noble - Eddy Crouse

A landmark of modernist cinema, Double Suicide brilliantly recasts traditional bunraku conventions to a cinematic form that is visually stunning and emotionally riveting. Using his trademark graphic sensibility, director Masahiro Shinoda never allows viewers to forget that they're watching an adaptation of a play. Just as the black clad puppeteers are visible during traditional bunraku performances, so are they seen throughout this film as they hand props to the actors, move sets, and -- as if agents of fate -- guide the characters to their inevitable bloody end. The sets turn and break down like a kabuki stage while the walls and floors, blow-ups of voluptuous Edo-period woodblock and abstract calligraphy, threaten to overwhelm the characters completely. Both through Monzaemon Chikamatsu's narrative and Shinoda's deconstructed style, the film seems to push the two doomed lovers toward their destiny while tragically hinting at a world beyond this fate. Shima Iwashita delivers the finest and most honored performance of her long and illustrious career as both the courtesan Koharu and self-sacrificing wife Osan. A masterful example of modernist filmmaking on every level, Double Suicide pulls off a rare feat: a film that wears its self-conscious theatricality on its sleeve while still creating a drama that is emotionally compelling.

All Movie Guide - Jonathan Crow