Profound Desires of the Gods | |
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![]() DVD release of Profound Desires of the Gods (1968) | |
Directed by | Shōhei Imamura |
Written by | Keiji Hasebe Shohei Imamura |
Produced by | Masanori Yamanoi |
Starring | Rentarō Mikuni Chōichirō Kawarazaki Kazuo Kitamura Hideko Okiyama Yoshi Katō Yasuko Matsui Kanjūrō Arashi |
Cinematography | Masao Tochizawa |
Edited by | Matsuo Tanji |
Music by | Toshiro Mayuzumi |
Distributed by | Nikkatsu Corporation, Toho International Company Inc. (USA, 1970), East West Classics (USA, 1988) |
Release date |
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Running time | 172 minutes |
Country | Japan |
Language | Japanese |
Profound Desires of the Gods or Deep Desires of Gods or Kuragejima – Legends from a Southern Island (神々の深き欲望, Kamigami no Fukaki Yokubō) is a 1968 Japanese film by director Shohei Imamura. The culmination of the director's examinations of the fringes of Japanese society throughout the 1960s, the film was an 18-month super-production which failed to make an impression at the time of its release, but has since risen in stature.
Presenting a vast chronicle of life on the remote Kurage Island, the film centres on the disgraced, superstitious, interbred Futori family and the Tokyo engineer sent to supervise the creation of a new well for a sugar mill on the island – an encounter which leads to both conflict and complicity in strange and powerful ways.[1]
The film was Japan's submission to the 42nd Academy Awards for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, but was not accepted as a nominee.[3]