Endless Desire

Endless Desire (1958) is the third of four films directed by Shohei Imamura in 1958 and another studio assignment from Nikkatsu. It was based on an original script by Natto Wada who would go onto have several collaborations with, and eventually marry, director Kon Ichikawa. Despite the fact that this film was not written by Imamura it reflects several of his pet themes that will be explored later in other films. In this story five venal, greedy and desperate people converge in a small town from Tokyo to retrieve a cache of buried morphine that was stolen from war supplies, which they plan to sell for profit. These desperate people who, postwar survivalists, include a “fake teacher” Ryoji’s (Shoichi Ozawa) open-mouthed food chewing resembling that of a cow chewing on his cud, the seasoned and cynical Onuma, played by Taiji Tonoyama, and the femme fatale Shima Hashimoto (Misako Watanabe) who holds her own against the male members for malevolence while brandishing a gun. They need to dig a tunnel under a butcher shop to obtain the hidden morphine. There is a subplot involving a love affair between the nephew of the real-estate agent, from which they rent a house to do their digging, and the daughter of the butcher whose shop is above the treasure. The film also has elements of noir as the gang members are eliminated one by one due to their overwhelming greed. These themes will be further explored later in Imaura's breakthrough film Pigs and Battleships (1961) about corruption and crime surrounding an American military base. It is an interesting and entertiang step in the development of an auteur, but essentially a minor film in the director's filmography.

Comments

[ted]

Quite liked this one actually. Though admittedly different from his other works.

[MC]

I liked it as well, it is an entertaining genre film, but it doesn't rate with his best work. I also liked Stolen Desire as well. Minor Imamura is still better than most directors' films in my opinion.