Winter1946: young Yukiko is repatriated from French Indochina one year after Japan’s defeat. In Tokyo, she looks up Tomioka with whom she had a passionate wartime affair. But her lover breaks his promise: times have changed and he claims he can no longer leave his wife. Yukiko courageously lives through the post-war chaos holding fast to her love for Tomioka. This starkly realistic film offers no respite. As Audie Bock wrote, Naruse paints the portrait of an ever-open wound that we call life. This melodrama in sumptuous black and white is one of the Japanese maestro’s most powerful works, discovered belatedly in France. Starring his favourite actress, the wonderful Hideko Takamine.
M.F.M.
