The Insect Woman

THE INSECT WOMAN
NIPPON KONCHUKI
Japan
1963
123 Min
Black and White
2.35:1
Japanese
DIR Shohei Imamura
SCR Keiji Hasebe, Shohei Imamura
DP Shinsaku Himeda
CAST Keiko Aizawa, Masumi Harukawa, Sachiko Hidari, Emiko Azuma, Daizaburo Hirata, Seizaburo Kawazu, Teruko Kishi, Tanie Kitabayashi, Kazuo Kitamura, Asao Koike, Masakazu Kuwayama
ED Mutsuo Tanji
MUSIC Toshiro Mayuzumi
My Rating : 4/5

This is my second Imamura movie after The Pornographers which was a kind of a revelation to me. Imamura continues to amaze me in this movie which is truly a difficult experience. Stylistically, this movie is superb. It makes use of still images, montages,singing and voice overs in a unique manner apart from the realistic form of camera work and screenplay which had also impressed me in The Pornographers.
The movie is about the struggle of a woman in post war Japan and takes place over a period of 50 years. It showcases the decadence of morality and the greed for money. Religion has become a source of psychological relief for people who confess their sins before a group of strangers to be absolved and continue to sin again. All the people are lecherous and greedy. In fact there is a constant running joke about the protagonist being a devil. Giving birth to bastards seems to be the protagonists family tradition. The movie is so unabashed in its display of immorality that some sequences are difficult to digest and border on the outrageous (a la Godard’s Weekend).
Even though the movie shows immorality, there is no penance at the end. The protagonist is remorseless and refuses to give up her way of life in this hell on earth where humans crawl like insects and this is brilliantly conveyed through the montage of an insect crawling at the beginning of the movie and the protagonist similarly moving on her bare feet at the end