Rare Kon Ichikawa film returns to the limelight at Tokyo International Film Festival

by Chris MaGee

One TIFF has just ended and another TIFF begins. The 21st Annual Tokyo International Film Festival will be getting under way on October 18th and while the full line-up has yet to be announced there are some programming details that are popping up online. One of these will be a real treat for fans of "Tokyo Olympiad" and "Fires on the Plain" director Kon Ichikawa. According to Variety Asia Online "Fusa (Sono Kido o Totte)" a film that the legendary filmmaker made for Fuji TV in 1993 will be screened at this year's festival.

"Fusa" is based on the Shugoro Yamamoto short story "Passing Through the Wooden Gate" and stars Kiichi Nakai (The Magic Hour, Wakeful Nights) as a samurai whose marriage plans to a noble woman are disrupted when a young woman (Yuko Asano) suffering from amnesia arrives on the scene. The samurai is forced to marry this woman instead, but is fearful of what may be revealed should her memory return.

Besides it's original airing on Fuji TV and screenings at the Venices and Rotterdam film festival in 193 and 1994 "Fusa" has remained one of Ichikawa's more obscure works, so this will be a unique opportunity to catch a film by a true master of Japanese cinema.