The Thick-Walled Room
1956
Among the first Japanese films to deal directly with the scars of World War II, this drama about a group of rank-and-file Japanese soldiers jailed for crimes against humanity was adapted from the diaries of real prisoners.
Box Set Info
One of the most important filmmakers to emerge from Japan’s cinematic golden age, Masaki Kobayashi is remembered in great part today for his three-part epic The Human Condition (1959–61), but that is just one of the blistering films he made in a career dedicated to criticizing his country’s rigid social and political orders. He first found his voice—rebellious, angry, engaged—in the fifties, following his life-altering experiences as a soldier in World War II; the four films collected here, made during the same period as The Human Condition, reflect Kobayashi’s coming into his own as an artist. He fought to get these powerful dramas made at a studio more oriented at the time toward quiet family melodramas, and they are unforgettable depictions of a postwar Japan troubled by identity crises and moral corruption on scales both intimate and institutional.
Collector’s Set Includes
I Will Buy You
1956
Masaki Kobayashi’s pitiless take on Japan’s professional baseball industry is unlike any other sports film ever made.
Black River
1956
Perhaps Masaki Kobayashi’s most sordid film, Black River examines the rampant corruption on and around U.S. military bases in Japan following World War II.
The Inheritance
1962
On his deathbed, a wealthy businessman announces that his fortune is to be split equally among his three illegitimate children, whose whereabouts are unknown to his family and colleagues.
