Akihiko Shiota

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Minnie and Moskowitz

Emotions waver from moment to moment. A woman who tells a man she never wants to see him again might plead with him not to go five minutes later. The more fierce the emotion, the more likely it is to transform into another. With his depiction of that point, Cassavetes fundamentally altered how characters are described in cinema.

Freeze Die Come to Life

I know of no other film about a boy and girl that is as beautiful and harrowing. Like a comet, director Vitali Kanevsky burst onto the scene in the early 1990s, then disappeared after leaving behind four masterpieces. If only he would make a new film...I'm sure cinephiles around the world are eagerly awaiting that.

Unforgiven

Has any other film depicted the tragic nature of violence so accurately? If we were to search for another example,wouldn't we have to go all the way back to the era of Erich von Stroheim?

MIDARE-GUMO

Like Yasujiro Ozu, Robert Bresson, and Carl Theodor Dreyer, Mikio Naruse is one of several filmmakers whose posthumous work could be considered their greatest masterpiece. Towards the end of the film, a freight train seems as if it will stretch on forever as it passes in front of a man and woman attempting to cling on to a sliver of hope.It's an unforgettable scene. Mere coincidences such as that sometimes exert a decisive influence on the direction of human lives.

KIRU

Kenji Misumi is known internationally for his work on the Lone Wolf and Cub film series, but I'd say his true talent is harnessed to a fuller degree in works like Destiny's Son, in which stillness and resignation become vessels for an uncontrollable vortex of passion. It's also stunning to see the life of a man burdened with a cursed destiny be so exhaustively encapsulated within it's succinct 71-minute runtime.

SONEZAKI SHINJU

The films of Yasuzo Masumura, who directed numerous 'program pictures' for studio Daiei (where Kenji Mizoguchi also thrived), are entertaining without exception, including his post-Daiei output. This feature's protagonist, who cannot look anyone in the eye just like the main character in Dreyer's Gertrud, is played by Meiko Kaji from the 'female Prisoner Scorpion' film series. She radiates bodily warmth, to a sweltering degree that should go down in cinematic history. Masumura's work deserves to be rediscovered around the world.

Charley Varrick

The bank-robbing hero places explosives around the lifeless body of his wife in the driver's seat of their getaway vehicle, and mourns her death. Later, that act saves him from a crisis. Even criminals are worthy of love. What's more, in the films of Don Siegel, love makes itself visible for an instant within action. Just as it does in many other superlative films.

Emperor of the North

Looking at matters solely through a prism of good and evil can barely depict even ten per cent of the world as we know it. It cannot depict even ten per cent of human nature either. The films of Don Siegel and Robert Aldrich remind us of that. That is what makes them so superb.

Stromboli, terra di Dio

The women that Rossellini depicts are beautiful. In particular, when a woman who seemed to be a victim of the world instantaneously transforms into a victimizer, she begins to shine ever more beautifully. The absurdity of that is also a thing of beauty. because when it transpires, the film is simultaneously depicting a female individual and the world itself.

Sauve qui peut (la vie)

Modern cinema began with Rossellini, and Godard continued in the same vein. Ever since, no maker of modern cinema has emerged who can surpass him. That is a fact that no filmmaker can ever ignore.