Hot Picks

- Ready for My Close Up 2019

- Talk of the Dead 2016

- Homesick 2015

- Exteriors 2023

- Brotherly Lies 2022

- Pandemonium 2024

- All the Fires 2023

- Isleen Pines 2023

- I Was a Soldier 2024

- The Seductress from Hell 2024

- Dreaming of the Unholy 2024

- Part-Time Killer 2022

- Ruby's Choice 2022

- 6 Hours Away 2024

- Burnt Flowers 2024

- Final Heat 2024

- Stargazer 2023

- Max Beyond 2024

- What Is Buried Must Remain 2022

- Protanopia 2024

- Final Wager 2024

- Dagr 2024

- Hunting for the Hag 2024

- The Company Called Glitch That Nobody and Everybody Wanted 2024

- Coyote Cage 2023

- Tower Rats 2020

- Script of the Dead 2024

- The Bell Affair 2023

- Easter Bloody Easter 2024

- Velma 2022

- Everwinter Night 2023

- Main Character Energy 2023

- Stupid Games 2024

- Bittertooth 2023

- 4 Minutes of Terror: Night Slasher 2024

- Apart 2024

- The Abandoned 2006

- Becky 2024

- The Evil Fairy Queen 2024

- The Black Guelph 2022

- Followers 2024

- Silence of the Prey 2024

- Battle for the Western Front 2024

- Beware the Boogeyman 2024

- Subject 101 2022

- Driftwood 2023

- The Legend of Lake Hollow 2024

- Black Mass 2023

- Skinwalkers: American Werewolves 2 2023

- The Manifestation 2024

- Spirit Riser 2024

- Garden of Souls 2019

- It's a Wonderful Slice 2024

- Caleb & Sarah 2024

- First Impressions Can Kill 2017

- A Killer Conversation 2014

- Star Crash 1979

- Strangler of the Swamp 1946

Utamaro o Meguru Gonin no Onna

Utamaro and his Five Women
Five Women Around Utamaro

Japan 1946
produced by
Shochiku, Sinfonia
directed by Kenji Mizoguchi
starring Minosuke Bando, Kinuyo Tanaka, Kotaro Bando, Hiroko Kawasaki, Toshiko Iizuka, Kyoko Kusajima, Eiko Ohara, Mimpei Tomimoto, Shotaro Nakamura, Kiniko Shiratao
screenplay by Yoshikata Yoda, based on the novel by Kanji Kunieda, music by Tamezo Mochizuki, Hisato Osawa

review by
Mike Haberfelner

Quick Links

Abbott & Costello

The Addams Family

Alice in Wonderland

Arsène Lupin

Batman

Bigfoot

Black Emanuelle

Bomba the Jungle Boy

Bowery Boys

Bulldog Drummond

Captain America

Charlie Chan

Cinderella

Deerslayer

Dick Tracy

Dr. Mabuse

Dr. Orloff

Doctor Who

Dracula

Edgar Wallace made in Germany

Elizabeth Bathory

Emmanuelle

Fantomas

Flash Gordon

Frankenstein

Frankie & Annette Beach Party movies

Freddy Krueger

Fu Manchu

Fuzzy

Gamera

Godzilla

Hercules

El Hombre Lobo

Incredible Hulk

Jack the Ripper

James Bond

Jekyll and Hyde

Jerry Cotton

Jungle Jim

Justine

Kekko Kamen

King Kong

Laurel and Hardy

Lemmy Caution

Lobo

Lone Wolf and Cub

Lupin III

Maciste

Marx Brothers

Miss Marple

Mr. Moto

Mister Wong

Mothra

The Munsters

Nick Carter

OSS 117

Phantom of the Opera

Philip Marlowe

Philo Vance

Quatermass

Robin Hood

The Saint

Santa Claus

El Santo

Schoolgirl Report

The Shadow

Sherlock Holmes

Spider-Man

Star Trek

Sukeban Deka

Superman

Tarzan

Three Mesquiteers

Three Musketeers

Three Stooges

Three Supermen

Winnetou

Wizard of Oz

Wolf Man

Wonder Woman

Yojimbo

Zatoichi

Zorro

Available on DVD!

To buy, click on link(s) below and help keep this site afloat (commissions earned)

Always make sure of DVD-compatibility!!!


Tokyo, the 18th century: It all starts with painter Seinosuke (Kontaro Bando), who feels deeply insulted by the fact that Utamaro (Minosuke Bando), a common etchings painter spending most of his time portraying prostitutes, would insult his school's painting style. He wants to challenge Utamaro to a swordfight, but Utamaro prefers a painting duel, and by simply adding a few lines to the sketch of Seinosuke, Utamaro emerges the victor, and he leaves Seinosuke behind, deeply impressed.

Seinosuke decides to become Utamaro's student, even if that means dropping his fiancée Yukie (Eiko Ohara), who's from a well-to-do family and who's father would not accept his son-in-law being a common etchings painter.

These days, Utamaro is busy to paint the outline for an elaborate tattoo onto prostitute Takasode's (Toshiko Iizuka) back ... but once he's finished, she takes a powder with Shozaburo (Shotaro Nakamura), so far the boyfriend of Utamaro's best friend, prostitute Okita (Kinuyo Tanaka), who then makes Seinosuke her new loveslave, much to the dismay of Yukie, who has broken with her father just to be with her fiancé.

Somehow, Utamaro makes Okita reconsider, and thinks he has entangled the knot that has been created by people around him - but then he gets infatuated with Oran (Hiroko Kawasaki), an upperclass beauty, and behind her husband's back, he starts to draw her ... until her husband finds out and has him put under house arrest on false chrges, and his arms tied up for 50 days so he can't paint. Seinosuke, upon spotting Oran, falls in love with her, and the two elope. Yukie goes after them, only to have her heart broken.

Okita meanwhile has tracked down the love of his life Shozaburo, and she tries to get him back with nice words as well as with force, and when both don't work, she kills hium and Takasode both. Utamaro can persuade her to give herself up to the police, which might be the only way out of the death penalty ...

But there is a silver lining, all the problems began when he couldn't paint no more, but with his sentence served, his hands are free to paint again ...

 

Based on rather fictional episodes in real life painter Utamaro, Utamaro and his Five Women is one of the "lighter" films in Kenji Mizoguchi's filmography, yet it's still not a movie that tries to please ... but always offers a little bit of relief between the drama parts (like the developing romance between Utamaro's sidekick and his less than beautiful girlfriend amidst all the gorgeous but deeply troubled leading ladies). Still, the whole thing is carried by a subtle directorial effort combined with atmospheric camerawork and a great ensemble cast, all of which totally make this movie work as a timeless classic.

 

review © by Mike Haberfelner

 

Feeling lucky?
Want to
search
any of my partnershops yourself
for more, better results?
(commissions earned)

The links below
will take you
just there!!!

Find Utamaro and his Five Women
at the amazons ...

USA  amazon.com

Great Britain (a.k.a. the United Kingdom)  amazon.co.uk

Germany (East AND West)  amazon.de

Looking for imports?
Find Utamaro and his Five Women here ...

Thailand  eThaiCD.com
Your shop for all things Thai

Something naughty?
(Must be over 18 to go there!)

x-rated  find Utamaro and his Five Women at adultvideouniverse.com


Thanks for watching !!!

 

 

In times of uncertainty of a possible zombie outbreak, a woman has to decide between two men - only one of them's one of the undead.

 

There's No Such Thing as Zombies
starring
Luana Ribeira, Rudy Barrow and Rami Hilmi
special appearances by
Debra Lamb and Lynn Lowry

 

directed by
Eddie Bammeke

written by
Michael Haberfelner

produced by
Michael Haberfelner, Luana Ribeira and Eddie Bammeke

 

now streaming at

Amazon

Amazon UK

Vimeo

 

 

 

Robots and rats,
demons and potholes,
cuddly toys and
shopping mall Santas,
love and death and everything in between,
Tales to Chill
Your Bones to

is all of that.

 

Tales to Chill
Your Bones to
-
a collection of short stories and mini-plays
ranging from the horrific to the darkly humourous,
from the post-apocalyptic
to the weirdly romantic,
tales that will give you a chill and maybe a chuckle, all thought up by
the twisted mind of
screenwriter and film reviewer
Michael Haberfelner.

 

Tales to Chill
Your Bones to

the new anthology by
Michael Haberfelner

 

Out now from
Amazon!!!