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Sansho the Bailiff is a japonais film of genre Drama directed by Kenji Mizoguchi released in USA on 14 september 1955 with Kinuyo Tanaka

Sansho the Bailiff (1954)

Sanshō dayū

Sansho the Bailiff
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Released in USA 14 september 1955
Length 2h4
Directed by
OriginJapon
Genres Drama
Rating83% 4.195964.195964.195964.195964.19596

Sansho the Bailiff (山椒大夫, Sanshō Dayū) is a 1954 Japanese period film directed by Kenji Mizoguchi. Based on a short story of the same name by Mori Ōgai, it tells the story of two aristocratic children sold into slavery. It is often considered one of Mizoguchi's finest films, along with Ugetsu and The Life of Oharu. It bears his trademark interest in freedom, poverty and woman's place in society, and features beautiful images and long and complicated shots. The director of photography for this film was Mizoguchi's regular collaborator Kazuo Miyagawa.

In the United Kingdom and Ireland, it is known by its Japanese title Sanshō Dayū.

Synopsis

Sansho the Bailiff is a jidai-geki, or historical film, set in the Heian period of feudal Japan. A virtuous governor is banished by a feudal lord to a far-off province. His wife and children are sent to live with her brother. Several years later, the wife, Tamaki (Kinuyo Tanaka), and children, Zushiō and Anju, journey to his exiled land, but are tricked on the journey by a treacherous priestess. The mother is sold into prostitution in Sado and the children are sold by slave traders to a manorial estate in which slaves are brutalized, working under horrific conditions and branded when they try to escape. The estate, protected under the Minister of the Right, is administered by the eponymous Sanshō (Eitarō Shindō), a bailiff (or steward). Sanshō's son Tarō (Akitake Kōno), the second-in-charge, is a much more humane master, and he convinces the two they must survive in the manor before they can escape to find their father.

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