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KWAIDAN
A Ninjin Club Production
Produced by Shigeru Wakatsuki
Original Story by Yakumo Koizumi Screenplay by Yoko Mizuki
Director of Photography: Yoshio Miyajima
Sound effects by Toru Takemitsu
THE BLACK HAIR
Michiyo Aratama-Misako Watanabe Rentaro Mikuni
THE WOMAN OF THE SNOW
Tatsuya Nakadai Keiko Kishi
HOICHI, THE EARLESS
Katsuo Nakamura Tetsuro Tanba
IN A CUP OF TEA
Kanemon Nakamura Osamu Takizawa-Haruko Sugimura
Directed by Masaki Kobayashi
THE BLACK HAIR
In old Kyoto there was a young samurai
who had been reduced to poverty by the ruin of his lord.
He decided to leave his home
and take service with the governor of a distant province.
Goodbye.
Stay well. I can't live here with you. I have a future.
For men, advancement is the most important.
I can't give it up just because of you.
I can't bury my future here.
Must you leave Kyoto?
I'll work harder than before. I'll weave day and night.
I'll slave for a better living.
If I lose this chance, I'll be finished.
Don't try to stop me. The new post will bring me fortune.
If you can remarry a man of some distinction,
you'll have fortune too.
There's nothing more to say.
I've had enough of poverty!
You're going to leave early in the morning.
So you better go to bed now.
Take her to the bridal chamber.
My daughter is finally married.
I feel relieved now.
I'm glad to have you in my family.
Thank you.
He knows his obligation. He'll serve her well.
Please, take care of my daughter.
Yes.
The samurai could not understand the value of love.
He divorced his good wife
and married the daughter of a noted family to gain position.
And he took her to his new post.
It was the thoughtlessness of youth
and the experience of desire.
His second marriage did not prove a happy one.
His new wife was selfish and callous.
He soon found every cause to recall with regret his Kyoto days.
Then he discovered he still loved his first wife -
loved her more than he could ever love his second.
And he began to realise how unfair
and how ungrateful he had been.
Memories of a woman he had wronged -
her gentle speech,
her smile,
her pretty dainty ways,
her impeccable patience...
...continuously haunted him.
I quit!
The same old game!
I'm tired of it!
Girls, you're dismissed.
You better go to bed now.
Your husband is still reading.
How ungrateful you are!
You've gained position because of my family's social prestige.
You only used me.
You're always cherishing your old memories.
You're walking out on me!
The dew won't help.
Please, go to your bedroom
and nurse her ladyship.
Nurse her? That's your duty.
Don't say that.
She may return to her parents tomorrow if she wants to.
I can't stand seeing her dissatisfied look any more.
Tell her so.
After all, I was young and thoughtless.
I'll find my ex-wife whom I deserted
and make amends for my sinful act.
The years went by.
And his official term expired.
It was September 10th when he reached the street of Kyoto
where his first wife used to live.
It was midnight and the city was as silent as a cemetery.
When did you come back to Kyoto?
Now. Just now.
How did you find your way to me, through all those black rooms?
Stay seated.
Don't bother.
I'll get supper.
I don't want it.
You haven't changed a bit.
You look just like you did before.
Your face that I couldn't forget for a moment...
and your voice that was so dear to me!
Forgive me.
I was cruel. I was a fool.
I deserve your hatred.
Until the day my official term expired,
how I longed to come back to you!
How deeply I regretted my selfishness!
How wretched I was without you!
How I loathed myself for divorcing you!
How long I've hoped and planned to make amends!
As soon as I became free.
I wanted to come back to Kyoto and find you.
I hurried here in the dark.
It's very kind of you
thinking about me so much.
Forgive me.
Please forgive me.
I was such a fool!
Don't reproach yourself.
It's wrong to allow yourself to suffer on my account.
I always felt that I wasn't worthy of being your wife.
Don't...
I knew that, but I couldn't help trying to be near you.
Anyway, it was very cruel of me to have divorced you.
It was because of poverty.
While you lived with me, you were always kind.
Why should I think ill of you?
I prayed for your good fortune every day and night.
I'll make amends.
Forget it. You came a long way home.
What greater happiness than to see you again...
even if only for a moment?
Only for a moment!
Make it the length of seven lifetimes!
Unless you forbid it,
I'll live with you always... always!
Nothing shall ever separate us again.
Your fragrant hair! It's the same as before.
The same glossy hair...
dark eyes...
Iovely nose...
soft cheeks...
and...
I've forgotten my sorrow.
Many things have happened in Kyoto since you went away.
I imagine so.
I can't tell you everything in a night.
Soon it'll be dawn.
Yes. This room is very dear to me.
It was our bridal chamber.
We spent several nights here.
I don't want to sleep now.
I want to talk of the past and the present and the future with you
and feel as happy as I am now.
I also feel as if this were a dream.
I don't want to sleep for a moment
so I can keep you forever.
THE WOMAN OF THE SNOW
In a village of Musashi Province
there lived two woodcutters: Mosaku and Minokichi.
Mosaku was an old man
and Minokichi, his apprentice, was a boy of eighteen.
Everyday, they went to a forest a few miles away
from the village.
One cold day, a great snowstorm overtook them on their way home.
The boatman had left his boat on the other side of the river.
It was no day for swimming.
I intended to treat you like the other man.
But I couldn't help feeling pity for you
because you're so young.
You're a handsome boy.
I will not hurt you now.
But if you ever tell anybody - even your own mother
about what you've seen tonight, I'll know it.
And then I'll kill you.
Remember that.
Understand?
I'll be going now.
We sell wood for a living.
You can't work for some time, not before spring.
The terrible cold night made you ill.
Eat the porridge.
Take care of yourself, son.
Or you'll be frozen
and dead like that old Mosaku
whose blood was all gone.
If this happens to you again,
you won't survive.
Are you listening?
You've said nothing about that night.
A year passed.
As soon as he got well, he resumed working.
Every morning, he went to the forest alone
and returned with bundles of wood after sunset.
Where are you going in the evening?
Edo.
Now?
Yes.
I lost my parents.
My relatives in Edo might help me find work as a servant.
Brothers?
None?
You'd need connections
to find work in Edo.
Is it so hard to get work
when you don't know anyone?
You could get married...
With you?
Come!
That's my house.
Why don't you take a rest?
There's nobody you have to mind.
But...
Only my mother and I live there. Come!
Your name is Yuki? I see, I see.
Going to Edo alone
sounds very dangerous.
People are not always kind.
Young girls must be careful
not to be bothered by bad men.
Come eat while it's hot.
And Yuki bore him three children,
handsome and very fair of skin.
She acquired a fame for being a good wife among the villagers.
Take a moment to reflect on Grandma's grave.
Show her you've grown up.
Give her your flowers.
It seems she never gets old.
Really.
She's as young today as on the day she first came into the village.
She's a wonder.
Were you at the grave?
Yes. It's my mother-in-law's memorial day.
That's good.
She must be pleased to see her nice grandchildren
praying for her.
She's happy.
She died praising her son's wife.
It's not very common.
No.
Usually, a mother-in-law talks ill of her son's wife.
No matter how good the wife is.
That's not true.
Thanks to you, I'm happy.
What a happy couple, you and your husband!
He must be happy.
He has such a good and beautiful woman for a wife.
Naturally.
What a young wife!
Most peasant women age early
after having three children.
She still looks like a girl.
She's a wonder.
Put them on.
Is it too small?
And the children's?
I made them.
How nice! All ready... the sandals for the holiday season!
If the thongs are too tight, I'll fix them.
Now try them on.
Yes.
How beautiful! Why the red thongs?
You're still young.
I'm a mother of three children.
Red is still your colour.
Your feet look beautiful.
It fits well.
Not too tight, not too lose.
It's exactly my size.
Your sandals look beautiful and sturdy
so people come to you for special orders.
This pair is exceedingly good.
I made them so that they'll match your kimono.
As if I were going away on a journey!
I can't buy you a new kimono, so at least you have sandals.
With your sandals and my kimono
our children will have a wonderful holiday.
How is it going?
A few more stitches.
Why are you watching me so intently?
I just remembered that night ten years ago.
It's strange to recall it now after so many years.
You're sewing with the light on your face
and I'm looking up at you like this.
That's why I remembered that night...
What night?
A strange thing happened that night.
I can remember it well as if it happened yesterday.
I was eighteen then. I never told anybody about that night.
I'm not sure it was real or a dream.
It was the night that old Mosaku was frozen dead
as if his blood were all gone.
I saw with my own eyes a woman who was bending over him.
And she was blowing her breath like a white smoke upon him.
Then he became stiff and couldn't move.
That woman stooped over me, too.
And I got almost numb.
Then,
the eyes of the horrible woman
looked very, very beautiful.
She was so beautiful
and white like you.
Yes!
You looked exactly like her just now.
That's why I remembered.
Once the memory haunted me day and night.
I became sick after that.
I tell you, it was when I spent
the terrible snowstormy night in the ferryman's hut.
I saw very clearly the weird woman who killed old Mosaku.
I've never seen in my life a woman as beautiful and white
as her except you.
Of course, she's not a human being and I was afraid of her.
She was the Woman of the Snow who was hungry for warm blood...
...or a dream.
Not a dream.
I...
It was me.
Me!
It was Yuki.
You promised that night you'd never tell anybody.
You finally broke the promise.
It was a pledge for life for both of us.
I told you if you broke it, I would kill you.
You betrayed me!
Ah, if it were not for those children asleep there
I would kill you this moment!
From now on
you'd better take good care of those children.
If they have any reason to complain about you
I'll treat you as you deserve!
Intermission
HOICHI, THE EARLESS
The time had come.
It was dawn on March 24th
in Year 1 of the Genryaku era (1185)
The armies of the Genji and Heiké clans were determined
to fight one last time at Dan-no-ura, off Kyushu
in the Shimonoséki Strait.
Procurator Kanzo from Kumano
had hoisted the Kongo-Doji flag
and placed on the frontline
the boats belonging to Kawanano Michinobu, inhabitant of the Province of Lyo.
He'd decided to side with the Genji
with his warriors, on board two hundred ships.
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