- Actors: Kazuo Kitamura
- Directors: Shohei Imamura
- Format: Colour, DVD-Video, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
- Language Japanese
- Subtitles: English
- Region: Region 1 (US and Canada DVD formats.)
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9 - 1.85:1
- Number of discs: 1
- Classification: Unrated (US MPAA rating. See details.)
- Studio: Animeigo
- DVD Release Date: 20 Oct 2009
- Run Time: 123 minutes
- Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
- ASIN: B002FG9NAU
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 65,981 in Film & TV (See Top 100 in Film & TV)
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:DVD
The family of a young woman find it difficult to find her a suitor in post war Japan as she is suspected of suffering from Radiation Sickness when she was exposed to the black rain that fell shortly after the explosion of the Atomic bomb at Hiroshima.
An award winning film that looks at the aftermath and long term effects of the atom bomb. A human story not just about the destruction of a city but of the lives of survivors, their relationships, families, communities and their bodies. The director avoids sensationalism and maintains restraint thereby increasing the impact of the film
An award winning film that looks at the aftermath and long term effects of the atom bomb. A human story not just about the destruction of a city but of the lives of survivors, their relationships, families, communities and their bodies. The director avoids sensationalism and maintains restraint thereby increasing the impact of the film
3 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:DVD
Imamura adapted Black Rain from the novel by Masuji Ibuse.The film is about the moment when the atom bomb dropped on Hiroshima and the period of its aftermath.Yasuko(Yoshiko Tanaka) is a young woman living with her uncle Shigeko and her aunt Shigematsu.There are a few moments before it drops(we know what's to come)when everyday life assumes an eternal intensity,even a stray dog.We see people in a tram car blown across the tram at zero hour.These early scenes are stark,direct, difficult to watch and unforgettable.We see flesh melting off a man's bones,the tiny charred corpse clutched by a mother.Mr and Mrs Shizumo and their neice make their way through the ruins of Hiroshima devastated by the atomic bomb.The black rain that drops on Yasuko's face(ash+radiation+rain) is thought to bear no harm.Her uncle's face is burned.They all think because they did not witness the flash emitted directly, they may be alright.The film moves to 5 years later.Yasuko is living with her aunt, uncle, and senile grandmother in a village containing many survivors of the bombing.We are in the slow-take still-frame setting of an Ozu-like existence with Yasuko's aunt and uncle getting on with their lives,trying to marry her off.They wait under the dread that the radiation sickness affecting so many survivors will claim them too.She wants to remain with them. Yasuko does not appear to be affected,her uncle even uses her diary to get her a cleared medical certificate to show her prospective suitors.Many of their old acquaintances are dropping.They attend funerals, consult astrologers, chant mantras,life goes on.There are rumours that Yasuko was near ground zero,she even mentions her fear to a suitor that she may succumb at any time to radiation sickness.A dying man wants to understand why the bomb was ever dropped.There is broadcast that the Americans may use it in N.Korea.There are moments of unrelieved gloom and terror.Imamura's subject is not about who dropped the bomb,but his anger at the terrible economic, social,biological,and traumatic effects on Japanese society,the discrimination,the prejudice,the lack of understanding,the fear that it was hereditary and contagious.There are moments of great beauty especially towards the end where a never-before-seen great carp of legend jumps out of a pond with great vitality,showing the resilience of the spirit.I have not seen any of his other films but have heard of their bawdiness and colour.The
dvd package contains an alternate colour ending,interviews with an assitant director and actress Tanaka,trailers,
cast and crew biographies,multimedia vault,image gallery,program notes,American anti-Japanese propaganda films.
dvd package contains an alternate colour ending,interviews with an assitant director and actress Tanaka,trailers,
cast and crew biographies,multimedia vault,image gallery,program notes,American anti-Japanese propaganda films.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
32 reviews
23 of 23 people found the following review helpful
A MASTERPIECE
23 April 1999
Format:DVD
BLACK RAIN is the only movie of director Shohei Imamura that can be found in the DVD standard. It's a pity since this director is still one of the most interesting japanese directors even if he's now 72 years old. Winner of two Cannes Palmes d'Or ith THE EEL and THE BALLAD OF NARAYAMA, he isn't properly speaking a newcomer but his work deserves to be known by a wider audience.
The black rain is the name Japanese people have given to the rain that fell on Hiroshima right after the nuclear bombing of this island. Black and deadly. The movie, shot in black and white, tells the story of a couple of survivors and their struggle to stay alive and be part of the new japanese society born after the emperor's surrender.
One could say that BLACK RAIN's rythm is slow but I think it's a courageous choice of Shohei Imamura in order that we feel the fear of these people waiting their whole life for the first signs of the inevitable diseases provoked by radioactivity. In between, they try to survive like Yasuko, the heroin, whose search for a husband is pathetic.
Two scenes will stay in your memory. Firstly, the description of Hiroshima in comparison of which those horror movies Hollywood produces by the dozen seem, for the least, ridiculous. And this scene when Yasuko, filled with hope, waits for a shining rainbow, symbolizing life. You wait with her, with all your heart, until you remember that this film is shot in black and white. Simply magistral.
A scene access as sole extra-feature.
A DVD for your library.
25 of 26 people found the following review helpful
A prayer for peace and tolerance
5 Mar 2000
Format:DVD
This is a wonderful black and white film by one of Japan's foremost Directors, Shohei Imamura. The film also features the outstanding music of Japan's foremost modern composer, Toru Takemitsu. He also provided the score for Hiroshi Teshigahara's classic, "Woman In the Dunes".
"Black Rain" explores a difficult subject, the bombing of Hiroshima, but does it not by assigning blame for the bombing. Rather Imamura depicts the intollerance of humanity that leads to all wars and their equally terrible aftermath. The characters in the film, all very well acted, are dealing with radiation illness and their positions as new social outcasts in postwar Japan. Perhaps one of the most moving scenes is that of the three Buddhist prayers or "sutras" for Hiroshima's dead chanted by a layman in the absence of the clergy. Indeed the film is one long prayer for peace and tolerance.
The quality of this DVD is acceptable but it seems a shame that Fox Lorber does not seem inclined, with this or many other of their DVDs, to provide any bonus materials.
15 of 15 people found the following review helpful
Life after the bombs: impressive/profound human interest
22 May 1999
Immamura's tour de force about a girl and her blood relatives' attempt to go on with life after surviving the August '45 bombing. While the film has been described as "restrained", it is also possible to receive the film as an incredibly eruptive effort: one that portrays its characters *always* on the verge of breaking down -- both physically and mentally -- from the wholly destructive and lingering effects of the bombs. While the ending escalates to full-blown helplessness (by using a self-reflexive comment about the limits of black and white film), the acting is an absolute success, particularly by the girl and the carver that loves her.
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