BFI: An Actor's Revenge

I was surprised to find out that there was a 1995 British Film Institute Film Classics edition of Kon Ichikawa's 1963 visual masterpiece. This edition was written by Ian Breakwell a multi-media artist, diarist and video-maker. It seems to be shorter than most books in the I serious and begins by weaving in personal connections to his first viewing in Bristol in 1967 and the subsequent second viewing in London in 1994 and his descriptions of what took place in the film. Then he writs an epilogue merging his personal reactions with Ichikawa's vision. I think he is particularly good on pointing out the effective uses of sound in the film. However, I think there could have been more background on the origins of the film, Kabuki theater, and Japanese history and its context in the film.