Hoichi donned his sandals, took his biwa, and went away with the stranger, who guided him deftly, but obliged him to walk very fast. As he is traveling incognito, [6] he commands that no mention of these things be made… You are now free to go back to your temple.”. The story is called Mimi-Nashi-Hoichi which means Hoichi the Earless. I had to attend to some private business; and I could not arrange the matter at any other hour.”, The priest was surprised, rather than pained, by Hoichi’s reticence: he felt it to be unnatural, and suspected something wrong. They direct him to chant the final battle - the battle of Dan-no-ura. The film consists of four separate and unrelated stories. Hoichi long hesitated to speak. AKA: Kaidan, Ghost Stories, Ghost Story, Kwaidan , Ghost Stories, Hoichi the Earless Kwaidan. He wished to view the scene of the battle of Dan-no-ura; and to-day he visited that place. A 1964 film directed by Masaki Kobayashi, based on the Japanese ghost stories collected and translated by Lafcadio Hearn. The head monk paints Hoichi's body with prayer verses to protect him, but unfortunately overlooks Hoichi's ears. In the light, Minokichi recalls the Yuki-onna and see a resemblance between them. He manages to escape, only to be attacked by his ex-wife’s black hair. [7], In a 1967 review, the Monthly Film Bulletin commented on the colour in the film, stating that "it is not so much that the colour in Kwaidan is ravishing...as the way Kobayashi uses it to give these stories something of the quality of a legend. [1] The film won international awards including Special Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival and was nominated for the Best Foreign Language Film at the Academy Awards. Change ), You are commenting using your Twitter account. Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan, Exotics and Retrospectives, and Kwaidan to name a few. Realising that continued performances will be fatal to Hoichi, the priests of his temple decide to take action. While the party is resting there, Sekinai sees the face of a strange man in a cup of tea. The story is called Mimi-Nashi-Hoichi which means Hoichi the Earless. The second wife is furious when she realizes that the swordsman not only married her to obtain her family's wealth, but also still longs for his old life in Kyoto with his ex-wife. O-Tei is a woman from the story The story of O-Tei. Doug Buddhism, Japan, Literature August 17, 2020 August 17, 2020 15 Minutes. It was released to Japanese theaters on January 6, 1965 and to American theaters on July 15 of the same year. However, despite his new wealthy status, the swordsman's second marriage proves to be unhappy. A spectral samurai appears and tells him that his lord wishes to have a performance at his house. Afterwards, being much impressed by the wonderful skill of the lad, the priest proposed that Hoichi should make the temple his home; and this offer was gratefully accepted. Mimi-Nashi-Hoichi. When this had been done, the priest instructed Hoichi, saying:–, “To-night, as soon as I go away, you must seat yourself on the verandah, and wait. Then Hoichi lifted up his voice, and chanted the chant of the fight on the bitter sea,–wonderfully making his biwa to sound like the straining of oars and the rushing of ships, the whirr and the hissing of arrows, the shouting and trampling of men, the crashing of steel upon helmets, the plunging of slain in the flood. “The Woman of the Snow,” (Yuki-Onna) and “Hoichi the Earless” (Mimi-Nashi-Hoichi) come from Kwaidan, the book. Change ), You are commenting using your Facebook account. A classic collection of four Japanese Horror stories. The samurai re-appears and calls out for Hoichi. But it was a rainy night, and very dark; and before the temple-folks could get to the roadway, Hoichi had disappeared. Kwaidan subtitles English. But the men at once hastened to the cemetery; and there, by the help of their lanterns, they discovered Hoichi,–sitting alone in the rain before the memorial tomb of Antoku Tenno, making his biwa resound, and loudly chanting the chant of the battle of Dan-no-ura. The narrator turns out to be Hoichi (Katsuo Nakamura), a blind biwa player who is lured away nightly by the spirits of the vanquished Heike clan to perform the tale of their anguish. Hearn’s book in its entirety can be … His new wife is shown to be callous and selfish. "The Black hair" (黒髪, Kurokami) was adapted from "The Reconciliation", which appeared in Hearn's collection Shadowings (1900). from Floyd Webb Plus . kwaidan said women be hauntin’. The samurai re-appears on the next night to take Hoichi and affirms that he has not told anyone. The film is based on stories from author Lafcadio Hearn's collections of Japanese folklore stories, namely Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things. The older women in the town are in awe over Yuki maintaining her youth even after having three children. There the Heike perished utterly, with their women and children, and their infant emperor likewise–now remembered as Antoku Tenno. Kwaidan’s third story is its longest and its best-known. Hoichi playing for his mysterious audience in a scene from the 1964 movie Kwaidan. We get a long, Kabuki-style drama that shows us that long ago, two great clans fought a sea battle. The swordsman informs the lady-in-waiting to tell his second wife that their marriage is over and she can return to her parents in shame. The spelling "kwaidan" for "ghost story" is deliberately old-fashioned; the current romanization would be "kaidan." Hoichi the Earless. The priest and the acolyte realize their error and believe the ears were a trade for Hoichi's life. And to left and right of him, in the pauses of his playing, he could hear voices murmuring praise: “How marvelous an artist!”–“Never in our own province was playing heard like this!”–“Not in all the empire is there another singer like Hoichi!” Then fresh courage came to him, and he played and sang yet better than before; and a hush of wonder deepened about him. After he had been helped to mount several stone steps, upon the last of which he was told to leave his sandals, a woman’s hand guided him along interminable reaches of polished planking, and round pillared angles too many to remember, and over widths amazing of matted floor,–into the middle of some vast apartment. Yuki then leaves Minokichi with the children, warning him to treat them well or she will return and kill him. But they would have destroyed you, sooner or later, in any event… Now I shall not be able to remain with you to-night: I am called away to perform another service. Kwaidan (怪談, Kaidan, lit. To begin with, all of the episodes eschew the usual O. Henry "twist" endings and deliberately telegraph their punches, case in point being "Hoichi the Earless", which gives away its climax with its very title! But, before I go, it will be necessary to protect your body by writing holy texts upon it.”, Before sundown the priest and his acolyte stripped Hoichi: then, with their writing-brushes, they traced upon his breast and back, head and face and neck, limbs and hands and feet,–even upon the soles of his feet, and upon all parts of his body,–the text of the holy sutra called Hannya-Shin-Kyo. The Great Battle 2. [1] The Japanese general release for Kwaidan began on February 27, 1965. ( Log Out /  More than seven hundred years ago, at Dan-no-ura, in the Straits of Shimonoseki, was fought the last battle of the long contest between the Heike, or Taira clan, and the Genji, or Minamoto clan. Kwaidan subtitles English. Winner of the Special Jury Prize at Cannes, Kwaidan features four nightmarish tales adapted from Lafcadio Hearn’s classic Japanese ghost stories about mortals caught up in forces beyond their comprehension when the supernatural world intervenes in their lives: “The Black Hair”, “The Woman of the Snow”, “Hoichi the Earless”, and “In a Cup of Tea”. How unfortunate that you did not tell me all this before! Hoichi is a young blind musician who plays the biwa. August 21, 2015. It also won awards for Best Cinematography and Best Art Direction at the Mainichi Film Concours. They believe the spirits will now leave him alone. Ghost Stories) is a 1965 horror anthology film produced by Ninjin Club and distributed by Toho.The film is based on stories from author Lafcadio Hearn's collections of Japanese folklore stories, namely Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things.It was released to Japanese theaters on January 6, 1965 and to American theaters on July 15 of the same year. The priest of the Amidaji was fond of poetry and music; and he often invited Hoichi to the temple, to play and recite. "Kwaidan (怪談 Kaidan?, literally "ghost stories") is a 1964 Japanese anthology horror film directed by Masaki Kobayashi. Hoichi informs the court that it takes many nights to chant the entire epic. Presently the samurai halted; and Hoichi became aware that they had arrived at a large gateway;–and he wondered, for he could not remember any large gate in that part of the town, except the main gate of the Amidaji. HOICHI THE EARLESS Hoichi is a young blind singer/storyteller who’s relating of a saga of warring clans so impresses a ghost emperor that he’s repeatedly summoned to perform for him, a demand which takes a toll on Hoichi’s own spirit. otherworldly and haunting. From either side of his head, the blind man felt a thick warm trickling; but he dared not lift his hands…. According to legend, Hoichi was a blind minstrel (or biwa hoshi) with amazing gifts for the biwa (a loquat-shaped Japanese lute). Too close, in fact, that the ghosts demand he do a late night performance for them. The priest of the Amidaji was fond of poetry and music; and he often invited Hoichi to the temple, to play and recite. He was particularly good at performing the Tale of the Heike, an epic describing the fall of Emperor Antoku, who is buried at Amidaji Temple. [citation needed]. Hoichi was given a room in the temple-building; and, in return for food and lodging, he was required only to gratify the priest with a musical performance on certain evenings, when otherwise disengaged. You'll get an email every time I make a new post. ‘Hoichi the Earless’ is the longest story of the four, telling not only the tale of the final climactic sea battle between the Heike and Genji clans, but the story of a blind young monk called Hoichi, skilled in playing the biwa (a type of lute) who finds himself lured away by the ghosts of the dead warriors to retell the story of their death every night. The bizarre supernatural tale of Hoichi the Earless (from Kwaidan) is given a surreal spin in a new interpretation by three innovative artists from Japan. A classic collection of four Japanese Horror stories. They both flee the scene in terror when they discover the author trapped inside a large jar of water. Probably the most well-known and popular of these stories is the 3rd one titled HOICHI THE EARLESS. Kwaidan (DVD) : Consists of four stories of the supernatural based on Japanese folk material. Toho's Cannes Film Festival Prize Winner. Kwaidan -- (Movie Clip) Hoichi, the Earless. Features "Black Hair", "The Woman in the Snow", "Hoichi the Earless" and "In a Cup of Tea". There was a noise of heavy feet mounting upon the verandah. This is the character from the first story. The Downpour 7. Minokichi places her sandals outside in the snow, and after he goes back inside, they disappear as Yuki accepts them. "Kwaidan" is a symphony of color and sound that is truly past compare. But at last, finding that his conduct had really alarmed and angered the good priest, he decided to abandon his reserve; and he related everything that had happened from the time of first visit of the samurai. Kwaidan subtitles. It was almost dawn when Hoichi returned; but his absence from the temple had not been observed,–as the priest, coming back at a very late hour, had supposed him asleep. that’s as much as i wanna write, so i’m not gonna say haunt anymore. Hoichi accepts the offer. Rapidly aging, he stumbles through the house, finding that it actually is in ruins and overgrown with weeds. She assures him that she understood that he only left her in order to bring income to their home. AKA: Hoichi the Earless Kwaidan, Kaidan, Ghost Stories, Ghost Story, Kwaidan , Ghost Stories. Toru Takemitsu's score for Kwaidan: (1) Opening titles (2) The Black Hair (3) The Woman of the Snow (4) Hoichi the Earless - Tale of the Heike (5) Hoichi the Earless - Preparations and the Ghost's Attack (6) In A Cup of Tea —From "Film Music by Toru Takemitsu, Volume 1" (JVC, 1990) "First, you have to be silent. 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