Jigoku

Nobuo Nakagawa

Japan

1960

101 minutes

Color

2.35:1

Japanese

352

Synopsis

Shocking, outrageous, and poetic, Jigoku (Hell, a.k.a. The Sinners of Hell) is the most innovative creation from Nobuo Nakagawa, the father of the Japanese horror film. After a young theology student flees a hit-and-run accident, he is plagued by both his own guilt-ridden conscience and a mysterious, diabolical doppelgänger. But all possible escape routes lead straight to hell—literally. In the gloriously gory final third of the film, Nakagawa offers up his vision of the underworld in a tour de force of torture and degradation. A striking departure from traditional Japanese ghost stories, Jigoku, with its truly eye-popping (and -gouging) imagery, created aftershocks that are still reverberating in contemporary world horror cinema.

Cast

Shiro Shimizu Shigeru Amachi
Yukiko/Sachiko Utako Mitsuya
TamuraYoichi Numata
Professor YajimaTorahiko Nakamura
Mrs. YajimaFumiko Miyata
Gozo ShimizuHiroshi Hayashi
Ito Shimizu Kimie Tokudaiji
KinukoAkiko Yamashita
Ensai TaniguchiJun Otomo
Dr. KusamaTomohiko Otani
Journalist Akagawa Koichi Miya

Credits

DirectorNobuo Nakagawa
ScreenplayIchiro Miyagawa and Nobuo Nakagawa
ProducerMitsugu Okura
CinematographyMamoru Morita
Production DesignHaruyasu Kurosawa
EditingToshio Goto
MusicChumei Watanabe
LightingHiroshi Ishimori
SoundKihachiro Nakai
Assistant directorKeinosuke Tsuchiya

Disc Features

  • New, restored high-definition digital transfer
  • Building the Inferno, a new documentary on director Nobuo Nakagawa and the making of the film, featuring exclusive interviews with actor Yoichi Numata, screenwriter Ichiro Miyagawa, Nakagawa collaborators Chiho Katsura and Kensuke Suzuki, and Cure and Doppelganger director Kiyoshi Kurosawa
  • Theatrical trailer
  • Galleries of posters from selected Nakagawa and Shintoho Studios films
  • New and improved English subtitle translation
  • Plus: A new essay by noted Asian-cinema critic Chuck Stephens

From the Current

TALES FROM THE CRITERION CRYPT

Oct 30, 2009

In the spirit of the season, we asked a select coven of horror mavens (including a couple of our own) to write about their favorite Criterion scarefests.   445...

Jigoku: Hell on Earth

by Chuck Stephens Sep 18, 2006

Never mind that damnation to the fires of Hades is said to be eternal. For some of us, the wait we’ve already endured for a glimpse of hell has been plenty long enough. Director Nobuo Nakagawa’s Hell, that is, otherwise known as Jigoku (1960), the legendary—and for Western audiences, long...

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Available Editions

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DVD

1 Disc

SRP: $29.95

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$23.96