Sansho Dayu (aka Sansho The Bailiff) (1954)

In feudal Japan, after their governor father is exiled for refusing to carry out his lord's orders, his wife (Kinuyo Tanaka), son (Masahiko Tsugawa) and daughter (Keiko Enami) are sold into slavery. The mother is forced into prostitution and the children grow into adulthood as slaves. But while she (now Kyoko Kagawa) still retains the righteous morality taught by their father, he (now Yoshiaki Hanayagi) has taken on the cruelty of his owner. This is a superb film, the great Kenji Mizoguchi's masterpiece! This was my first viewing and I don't know what took me so long to get around to it, perhaps I was intimidated by its reputation, but it's every bit as unforgettable as its standing dictates. It's an intimate epic about barbarism's slow journey of baby steps to enlightenment and with an ending that could pull tears out of a stone. Despite the film's title, Sansho the bailiff (Eitaro Shindo), the pitiless slave owner, is peripheral to the story which is centered on the family's survival despite the inhumanity and hardships they endure. It's the kind of film you'll never forget. The delicate score is by Fumio Hayasaka, one of the best Japanese film scores I've heard. With Akitake Kono, Ichiro Sugai and Kikue Mori.