In the Realm of the Senses

Nagisa Oshima

 
In the Realm of the Senses (Criterion Blu-Ray)

Blu-Ray

1 Disc

SRP: $39.95

Criterion Store price:$31.96

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  • Japan
  • 1976
  • 102 minutes
  • Color
  • 1.66:1
  • Japanese
  •  
  • Spine #466

SYNOPSIS: Still censored in its own country, In the Realm of the Senses (Ai no corrida), by Japanese director Nagisa Oshima, remains one of the most controversial films of all time. A graphic portrayal of insatiable sexual desire, Oshima’s film, set in 1936 and based on a true incident, depicts a man and a woman (Tatsuya Fuji and Eiko Matsuda) consumed by a transcendent, destructive love while living in an era of ever escalating imperialism and governmental control. Less a work of pornography than of politics, In the Realm of the Senses is a brave, taboo-breaking milestone.
WARNING: THIS FILM IS SEXUALLY EXPLICIT

Cast & CreditsOpen

Cast

Sada AbeEiko Matsuda
KichizoTatsuya Fuji
TokuAoi Nakajima
Inn manager Yasuko Matsui
Yoshidaya maidMeika Seri
Old maidKanae Kobayashi
Old beggarTaiji Tonoyama
PatronKyôji Kokonoe

Credits

DirectorNagisa Oshima
ProducerAnatole Dauman
ScreenplayNagisa Oshima
Line producerKoji Wakamatsu
Consulting producerHayao Shibata
CinematographyHideo Ito
LightingKenichi Okamoto
Production designJusho Toda
MusicMinoru Miki
EditingKeiichi Uraoka and Patrick Sauvion
SoundTetsuo Yasuda
Costumes Jusho Toda and Masahiro Kato
MakeupKoji Takemura

Disc Features

  • New, restored high-definition digital transfer (with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray edition)
  • New audio commentary with film scholar Tony Rayns
  • New interview with actor Tatsuya Fuji
  • A 1976 interview with director Nagisa Oshima and actors Fuji and Eiko Matsuda, and a 2003 program featuring interviews with consulting producer Hayao Shibata, line producer, Koji Wakamatsu, assistant director Yoichi Sai, and film distributor Yoko Asakura
  • Deleted footage
  • U.S. trailer
  • New and improved English subtitle translation
  • PLUS: A booklet featuring an essay by Japanese film scholar Donald Richie and a reprinted interview with Oshima

From the CurrentView the Current »

Film Essays

Nagisa Oshima on In the Realm of the Senses

April 30, 2009

The following article, based on an interview with Nagisa Oshima conducted by Katsue Tomiyama in April 1983, first appeared, in slightly longer form, in the Japanese magazine Read more »

In the Realm of the Senses: Some Notes on Oshima and Pornography

By Donald RichieApril 30, 2009

The concept of “obscenity” is tested when we dare to look at something that we desire to see but have forbidden ourselves to look at. When we feel that everything Read more »


Clippings

On Oshima

March 15, 2011

Fans of Nagisa Oshima will be interested to hear that critic Jonathan Rosenbaum has posted on his blog his entire 2008 Artforum essay “The Sun Also Sets,” which was also reprinted in his 2010 book Goodbye Cinema Read more »

IN THE REALM OF JAMES QUANDT

June 11, 2009

Close Criterion collaborator and friend James Quandt, longtime senior programmer at the Cinematheque Ontario and whose theatrical traveling retrospectives are always major events in the film Read more »


Press Notes

PRESS NOTES: THE NOTORIOUS OSHIMA REVISITED

May 04, 2009

Perhaps the most shocking thing about Nagisa Oshima’s infamous, hard-core In the Realm of the Senses and savage ghost story Empire of Passion is just how elegant they are, a couple Read more »

Other Editions

In the Realm of the Senses (Criterion DVD)

DVD

1 Disc

SRP: $39.95

Criterion Store price:$31.96

+ Add to Cart