Saturday, July 19, 2008

Trapped in a World of Sand (rated 4 stars)

by Hiroshi Teshigahara

The Japanese film Woman in the Dunes is a simple story about a man on a bug-collecting expedition who stays in a small village and becomes trapped in a hole in the ground with a woman who lives in a house surrounded by sand. It’s a strange and beautiful film from the 1960s that explores existential themes as two people relate to each other and the villagers as the sand constantly blows into the hole covering them. Shot in black & white with a sparse soundtrack, it’s a poetic and enigmatic character study.

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