Gate of Hell (地獄門, Jigokumon) is a 1953 Japanese jidaigeki film directed by Teinosuke Kinugasa.[1][2] It tells the story of a samurai (Kazuo Hasegawa) who tries to marry a woman (Machiko Kyō) he rescues, only to discover that she is already married. Filmed using Eastmancolor, Gate of Hell was Daiei Film's first color film and the first Japanese color film to be released outside Japan. It was digitally restored in 2011 by the National Film Center of the National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo and Kadokawa Shoten Co., LTD. in cooperation with NHK.
The film begins during the Heiji Rebellion in 1160. Lord Kiyomori "the Monk" of the Taira clan has taken his whole family on a pilgrimage to the Itsukushima Shrine. In his absence, the Cavalry Chief Yoshitomo of the Minamoto clan, and the Guard Chief, Nobuyori of the Fujiwara clan, attacked Sanjo Palace, the residence of former Emperor Go-Shirakawa in a coup. The samurai Endō Morito is assigned the duty of escorting lady-in-waiting Kesa away from the palace once she volunteers to disguise herself as the daimyō’s sister, buying the daimyō’s father and real sister time to escape unseen. The pair escape a bloody skirmish with their lives, and flee to Morito’s brother’s home, but Kesa is unconscious. Morito sprays her with water repeatedly to try to wake her, and in a last-ditch effort, feeds her water from his mouth, which rouses her. The pair are interrupted by a samurai who says he is with the Cavalry, one of the two groups who betrayed the daimyō. The hotheaded Morito immediately begins dueling the samurai, but Morito’s brother arrives and puts a stop to the duel. Morito learns his brother has also betrayed the daimyō, claiming “the world has changed since a day ago.” Morito is unconvinced to join his brother and betray his master, but the battle is over, and he returns to the gate in the aftermath.
At the gate, Morito learns that he is suspected of betraying the daimyō, and offers to bring the news of what happened to the daimyō to prove his loyalty. At great personal risk, he makes the journey, and beats the other samurai en route to deliver the message themselves. Morito succeeds in his task, and is chosen to ride with Lord Kiyomon to stamp out the insurrection.
After the coup has failed, Morito runs into Kesa again, pleased to see she is well. He is immediately transfixed by her, and asks her to visit his home for dinner, but she declines. Her aunt explains Kesa is expected at the palace, and Morito is visibly reluctant to part with her.
At the palace, Lord Kiyomon rewards the warriors who rode with him with one single wish. Morito asks him for Kesa’s hand in marriage, to which Lord Kiyomon agrees, but Kiyomon’s son informs them both that she is married to Wataru Watanabe, a samurai of the Imperial Guard. Morito asks for her hand anyway, and Lord Kiyomon declines, offering any other wish Morito has. He refuses anything else Lord Kiyomon has to offer.
Morito grows agitated, continuing to search for any way he can claim Kesa as his own. Kesa expresses concern to Wataru, worried she is culpable for Morito’s obsession with her. Wataru reassures her she has done nothing wrong, and promises to protect her. Relieved, Kesa relaxes.
Kesa is summoned to the palace to perform koto music for Lord Kiyomon. Kiyomon admires her beauty, and in doing so, begins to sympathize with Morito. He calls upon Morito and decides to give him a chance to compete for Kesa’s hand. Morito enters a horse race in which Wataru is competing, and nearly attacks Wataru at a “Forget the Race” dinner after the race is over, visibly disturbing everyone around him.
Upset, Morito tries to visit Kesa, who asks her handmaid, Tone, to tell him she was at her aunt’s. Morito, having met Kesa’s aunt before, heads to the home and discovers the lie. He threatens Kesa’s aunt, calling her a liar and proclaiming he’ll search the whole house for her. Her aunt convinces Morito Kesa isn’t there, and Morito has her write a note to Kesa claiming she’s sick and needs Kesa to come see her. Kesa receives the note, and, with some encouragement from Wataru, travels to see her aunt.
Morito ambushes Kesa at the home, getting her alone and threatening to kill Wataru, her aunt, and even Kesa herself if she denies him. Kesa collapses to the floor and says she will fulfill his heart’s desires. Coerced by his violent tendencies and unhinged behavior, and scared for her loved ones, she details a plan for Morito to kill Wataru and claim her once she’s widowed.
Kesa returns home, and gives her loyal handmaid, Tone, a gift. She asks for sake, then tells Tone to retire for the night. Kesa then spends an evening drinking with her husband, visibly shaken but unwilling to tell Wataru what is wrong. She plays the koto for him one last time, and the two retire for the night. An indeterminate time later, Morito sneaks across the grounds and into a bedroom, dealing a decisive killing blow to a figure beneath the blankets. Morito quails once he sees he has slain Kesa, begging her to forgive him. Grief-stricken, he hurries to Wataru and wakes him, begging him to cut his head off, since he has just killed Kesa. He says she sacrificed herself, resigned to the knowledge that Morito wanted her despite her own wishes. Wataru rushes to Kesa’s side, crying and asking why she didn’t trust him to protect her.
Morito kneels in the courtyard, cutting off his topknot and vowing to start over as a monk. Morito quietly leaves in the predawn light, walking back out of the castle through the gate of hell.
After the Japan Society sponsored a U.S. release of the film in December 1954, Bosley Crowther reviewed it for The New York Times. According to Crowther:[4]
The secret, perhaps, of its rare excitement is the subtlety with which it blends a subterranean flood of hot emotions with the most magnificent flow of surface serenity. The tensions and agonies of violent passions are made to seethe behind a splendid silken screen of stern formality, dignity, self-discipline and sublime esthetic harmonies. The very essence of ancient Japanese culture is rendered a tangible stimulant in this film.
Samurai were the hereditary military nobility and officer caste of medieval and early-modern Japan from the late 12th century until their abolition in 1876. They were the well-paid retainers of the daimyo. They had high prestige and special privileges such as wearing two swords and Kiri-sute gomen. They cultivated the bushido codes of martial virtues, indifference to pain, and unflinching loyalty, engaging in many local battles.
Minamoto no Yoritomo was the founder and the first shogun of the Kamakura shogunate of Japan, ruling from 1192 until 1199. He was the husband of Hōjō Masako who acted as regent (shikken) after his death.
Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, art name Chōkōdō Shujin (澄江堂主人), was a Japanese writer active in the Taishō period in Japan. He is regarded as the "father of the Japanese short story", and Japan's premier literary award, the Akutagawa Prize, is named after him. He committed suicide at the age of 35 through an overdose of barbital.
The Heiji rebellion was a short civil war between rival subjects of the cloistered Emperor Go-Shirakawa of Japan in 1160 fought in order to resolve a dispute about political power. It was preceded by the Hōgen Rebellion in 1156. Heiji no ran is seen as a direct outcome of the earlier armed dispute; but unlike Hōgen no ran, which was a dispute between members of the same clan, this was rather a struggle for power between two rival clans. It is also seen as a precursor of a broader civil war.
Minamoto no Yoshitomo was the head of the Minamoto clan and a general of the late Heian period of Japanese history. His son Minamoto no Yoritomo became shōgun and founded the Kamakura shogunate, the first shogunate in the history of Japan.
Matsunaga Danjo Hisahide was a daimyō and head of the Yamato Matsunaga clan in Japan during the Sengoku period of the 16th century.
Teinosuke Kinugasa was a Japanese filmmaker. He was born in Kameyama, Mie Prefecture and died in Kyoto. Kinugasa won the 1954 Palme d'or at the Cannes Film Festival for Gate of Hell.
The Tale of the Heike is an epic account compiled prior to 1330 of the struggle between the Taira clan and Minamoto clan for control of Japan at the end of the 12th century in the Genpei War (1180–1185). Heike (平家) refers to the Taira (平), hei being the on'yomi reading of the first kanji and "ke" (家) means family. Note that in the title of the Genpei War, "hei" is in this combination read as "pei" and the "gen" (源) is the first kanji used in the Minamoto clan's name.
Kwaidan is a 1964 Japanese anthology horror film directed by Masaki Kobayashi. It is based on stories from Lafcadio Hearn's collections of Japanese folk tales, mainly Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things (1904), for which it is named. The film consists of four separate and unrelated stories. Kwaidan is an archaic transliteration of the term kaidan, meaning "ghost story". Receiving critical acclaim, the film won the Special Jury Prize at the 1965 Cannes Film Festival, and received an Academy Award nomination for Best Foreign Language Film.
The siege of the Sanjō Palace was the primary battle of the Heiji Rebellion during the late Heian period of Japan. The conflict arose from feud between court advisors Fujiwara no Nobuyori and Fujiwara no Michinori, both of the powerful Fujiwara clan, with each respectively allied alongside the warrior clans of the Minamoto (Genji) and Taira (Heiki). The Siege is the focal point of the Japanese war epic The Tale of Heiji and the corresponding Illustrated Scrolls of the Tales of the Heiji. The Night Attack on Sanjō Palace handscroll is the most prominent of the three extant Illustrated Scrolls and belongs to The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, in Boston, Massachusetts, where it currently resides on display.
Fujiwara no Nobuyori was one of the chief allies of Minamoto no Yoshitomo in the Heiji Rebellion of 1159. As a member of the Fujiwara clan, Nobuyori might have been in line to become regent, and he desired power, which he obtained for a short while following the Rebellion.
Samurai Rebellion is a 1967 Japanese jidaigeki film directed by Masaki Kobayashi. The film is based on Hairyozuma shimatsu, a short story by Yasuhiko Takiguchi.
East Asian cinema is cinema produced in East Asia or by people from this region. It is part of Asian cinema, which in turn is part of world cinema.
See What I Wanna See is a musical by Michael John LaChiusa based on three short stories by Ryūnosuke Akutagawa: "Kesa and Morito", "In a Grove" and Dragon: the Old Potter's Tale (1919). The story is told in two parts with two prologues. Each prologue involves the medieval lovers/killers Kesa and Morito. The first act follows a murder in Central Park in 1951 from the various perspectives of several different characters. Act two centers on a priest, wavering in his faith, who creates a hoax about a miracle.
Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart in the Land of Demons is the fifth in a series of six Japanese martial arts films based on the long-running Lone Wolf and Cub manga series about Ogami Ittō, a wandering assassin for hire who is accompanied by his young son, Daigoro.
Yoshitsune Senbon Zakura (義経千本桜), or Yoshitsune and the Thousand Cherry Trees, is a Japanese play, one of the three most popular and famous in the Kabuki repertoire. Originally written in 1747 for the jōruri puppet theater by Takeda Izumo II, Miyoshi Shōraku and Namiki Senryū I, it was adapted to kabuki the following year.
Many significant Japanese historical people of the Sengoku period appear in works of popular culture such as anime, manga, and video games. This article presents information on references to several historical people in such works.
Seppuku, sometimes referred to as hara-kiri, is a form of Japanese ritual suicide by disembowelment. It was originally reserved for samurai in their code of honour but was also practised by other Japanese people during the Shōwa period to restore honour for themselves or for their families. As a samurai practice, seppuku was used voluntarily by samurai to die with honour rather than fall into the hands of their enemies, as a form of capital punishment for samurai who had committed serious offences, or performed because they had brought shame to themselves. The ceremonial disembowelment, which is usually part of a more elaborate ritual and performed in front of spectators, consists of plunging a short blade, traditionally a tantō, into the belly and drawing the blade from left to right, slicing the belly open. If the cut is deep enough, it can sever the abdominal aorta, causing a rapid death by blood loss.
Sword of Desperation is a 2010 Japanese jidaigeki drama film directed by Hideyuki Hirayama. It was released in Japan on July 10, 2010. It was written by Hidehiro Itō and Itaru Era, based on a novel by Shūhei Fujisawa, and was produced by Hidehiro Itō.
Mongaku (文覚) was a Japanese samurai and Shingon Buddhist priest of the late Heian and early Kamakura period. He was a close associate of shogun Minamoto no Yoritomo, having contributed to the declaration of the Genpei War. Myōe was the disciple of his disciple Jōkaku. His secular name, before ordination, was Endō Moritō. He is also known as Mongaku Shōnin.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
