Shocktober: Kuroneko

Directed by Kaneto Shindo
Written by Kaneto Shindo
Starring Kichiemon Nakamura (Gintoki), Nobuko Otowa (Yone), and Kiwako Taichi (Shige)
Cinematography by Norimichi Igawa and Kiyomi Kuroda
Edited by Hisao Enoki

Released in 1968

I'd seen Kaneto Shindo's other major film in the Criterion Collection, Onibaba, before watching Kuroneko. I found it enjoyably lurid and frightening, but overall I thought it was more of a minor cult object than an underrated great. So color me surprised when I sat down to watch Kuroneko and was immediately entranced by it.

I dislike using "beautiful" as a descriptor, mainly because any film that's in focus and clearly-lit gets the word tossed at it, but there's no better way to describe Kuroneko's cinematography. It's beautiful, gorgeous, pretty, radiant, and stunning. It's also haunting, spooky, atmospheric, and moody. I'd rather post stills from the film than write about it. Phew, alright, now that I've exhausted my thesaurus, I'll try to get more concrete.

I've seen plenty of striking, black and white films at this point (8 1/2, Wings of Desire, Beauty and The Beast, Eraserhead, and Citizen Kane just to name a few), but none of them have quite the same look as Kuroneko. The whites are blindingly so, like the characters are moons, reflecting the sun's intense rays back at the viewer. And the blacks are either subsumed as light gray, or pitch as the darkest void of space. The contrast results in unbelievable moments. Like when spotlights shine on the characters and they dance around as the only light source in pools of total darkness.

Shindo's willingness to go for pure style produces unbelievable results (literally, in some moments). Due to the dense fog, double exposures, and trippy dancing used to establish the mood of Yone and Shige's haunted abode, I could never quite process the exact dimensions of the place. Which is great, and, I assume, totally intentional. The space occupies a strange nether-realm between the world of men and the plane of ghosts, and Shindo's technique goes a long way towards creating that effect.

Other moments made me smile solely from their outré craft, which might not be the best way to respond to a film, but, whatever, I couldn't help myself. Gintoki riding home, with a huge sun in the background, almost elicited a cheer from me. A sequence quickly transforming Gintoki from a dirty, matted-hair savage to a clean-cut samurai (there were a few scenes where I didn't recognize him), uses montage to great effect. There's even a shot that reminded me of Eraserhead. 

Aside from all that, Kuroneko is surprisingly emotional for a film about cat demons. Kuroneko opens with its two main characters being senselessly murdered by a roving band of warriors. Through sheer force of will, and the help of a black feline, they come back as avenging spirits. The potential for supernatural silliness is there, but the resurrected duo's situation is taken seriously. They retain a tiny sliver of their humanity and struggle with amnesia and the unending demands of their curse. Eventually, Gintoki recognizes the ghost Yone and Shige as his mother and wife respectively. Again, setting up tragic situations where the dark-world demands of the two wraiths conflicts with their human desires. Shige sacrifices herself for one last week of bliss with Gintoki, and, in the haunting, melancholic crescendo, Gintoki yells in frustration for his mother's recognition.  

If you couldn't tell from the previous six paragraphs of gushing, I unabashedly love this movie. Both because it was such a surprise, and just generally high-quality. It's a film I'm compelled to evangelize for. Kuroneko demands a sizable cult, scratch that, it deserves a huge audience and reappraisal as a classic. Horror-buff, cinephile, or film-newbie, all could find something to enjoy in Shindo's phantasmal tale.