Film screening: Yearning (Midareru)
Details and tickets purchase information:
https://harvardfilmarchive.org/calendar/yearning-2025-07
Harvard students admitted free to regularly priced shows.
Directed by Naruse Mikio.
With Takamine Hideko, Kayama Yuzo, Kusabue Mitsuko
Japan 1964, 35mm, b/w, 98 min.
Japanese with English subtitles
War widow Reiko (Takamine Hideko) finds herself at odds with her late husband's family. His sisters seek to fire her from the family grocery store, and her brother-in-law Koji (Kayama Yuzo) demands that she address his long-standing love for her. Reiko's true feelings remain a mystery, even as she slowly unravels in Koji's presence. Not only is Yearning a paragon of Naruse's command of glances and gestures, but it is also distinct for its union of repressed sexual desire, postwar family dynamics and the brutality of corporate business as entwined forces hindering women's independence. For her performance as Reiko, Takamine won the Locarno Film Festival's Best Actress award. – Kelley Dong
Harvard Film Archive special film series FLOATING CLOUDS… THE CINEMA OF NARUSE MIKIO co-sponsored by the Reischauer Institute