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Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1Audience Rating: Unrated Binding: DVD Brand: Image Entertainment EAN: 0715515022521 Format: Black & White, Closed-captioned, Dolby, DVD-Video, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC Item Dimensions: Label: Criterion Languages: Manufacturer: Criterion MPN: IMEDCC1684D Number Of Items: 1 Publisher: Criterion Region Code: 1 Release Date: February 20, 2007 Running Time: 111 minutes Studio: Criterion Theatrical Release Date: June 25, 1963 Editorial Review: Product Description: Studio: Image Entertainment Release Date: 02/13/2007 Amazon.com: Although its title is not instantly recognizable in the Great Movies canon, When a Woman Ascends the Stairs qualifies as a modest, graceful masterpiece. This 1959 film by Mikio Naruse has, like the director's reputation in general, slowly gained traction in the decades after Naruse's death in 1969... much like a woman quietly, discreetly walking up a staircase (the film's central and repeated image). The film considers the plight of a hostess in a goodtime-establishment in Tokyo's famous Ginza district; with her youth gone, it is now time to buy a bar of her own or latch onto a husband/benefactor. She is played by Hideko Takamine, a veteran of 17 Naruse films, whose melancholy, indomitable performance is the soul of the movie. The postwar production design is enhanced by the drinks-after-dark jazz music, which really roots in the film in an arena of almost desperate 1950s capitalism. The black-and-white widescreen photography, a jumble of slanting signs and beams and screens, fits Naruse's subtle method, which eschews big melodrama in favor of an incredibly nuanced appreciation for life's quiet disappointments. Naruse can offer no greater triumph than simply placing one's foot on a stair each night and summoning the strength to climb the staircase to work. In this film, that's enough. --Robert Horton On the DVD Bonus features are not extensive on Criterion's excellent disc, but they include an informative commentary track with Japanese-film guru Donald Richie and a lovely 13-minute interview with Tatsuya Nakadai, the mighty actor who was still a young up-and-comer when he played a supporting role in this film. A strong booklet includes a touching memorial essay about Naruse by leading lady Hideko Takamine and an appreciative essay by Philip Lopate, who keenly observes of the film, "[T]he preference for enlightened stoicism over glib redemption is pure Naruse." --Robert Horton Average Rating:
 Rating:  - Naruse, the 4th and often forgotten great Japanese director...I love cinema, but I don't know nearly as much about it as I would like to. All the same, I like to learn, and I often listen to the advice of those that know more. That is how I ended up watching "When a woman ascends the stairs" (1959), by Mikio Naruse. According to Ruben, a coworker who also happens to know a lot about cinema, Naruse (1905-1969) is, after Kurosawa, Mizoguchi and Ozu, "the 4th and often forgotten great Japanese director". Truth to be told, I hadn't even heard Naruse's ... Read More Rating:  - Stairs of Shame1960 marks a changing point in the world of Japanese film. The previous year Oshima Nagisa made his filmic debut with his stark Street of Love and Hope which eventually led to a number of young directors, including the likes of Shinoda Masahiro and Imamura Shohei, breaking the ranks of assistant directors to eventually form a group, although Oshima dislikes the label, of New Wave directors. These films tended to be quite edgy and their levels of sexuality and violence surpassed earlier films. However, ... Read More Rating: - Very good if unadventurousThis is my first viewing of a film by Mikio Naruse and I was very favorably impressed. He is/was extremely economical in his approach to film making and this is both a strength and perhaps also something of a weakness. Additionally, I hope all his films are not as humorless as this one is. As I watched this filmed I was reminded of Fellini's classic, Nights of Cabiria. Keiko and Cabiria are very similarly circumstanced, as another reviewer has noted. The scene about two-thirds of the way ... Read More Rating: - incredible movieI really enjoyed this masterpiece! What a nuanced director. I have only seen one other movie of Naruse's and it was the long 24 Eyes. I loved all the performances in this movie. Very touching. The facial expressions during the acting scenes were so subtle but very well done. If you are a fan of thoughtful Japanese film from the 1940's and 1950's, you will love this transition to modern Japan culture. I had really no idea how the hostess bars worked but this was the perfect ... Read More Rating: - MagnificentOne of the last and best of Naruse's films, "When a Woman Ascends the Stairs" showcases the subtle, forceful emotional expression that Naruse was so capable of invoking from his actors. This was written and produced by the great Ryuzo Kikushima, who expertly crafted a story perfectly suited to Naruse's ethos just as he had done many times for Kurosawa. The theme of downtrodden and constrained women in Japan's modern de facto patriarchal society has been exhaustively explored in Japanese film, but this is a ... Read More |
