“Today is the first day of a life of sacrifice.” 地獄門 [Jigokumon / Gate of Hell] (Teinosuke Kinugasa, 1953)
Aug
4
orange
The shrine's torii as seen in the film. Vermilion contains mercury, which not only acts as a preservative but is also believed to ward off evil. DP: Kōhei Sugiyama.
Orange: a building or structure*
– Moritoo Endō
Partially filmed near the 厳島神社 (Itsukushima Shrine) with its striking vermilion torii.
Shot on Eastmancolor, relatively cheap and globally available, and influenced by Hollywood colour melodramas of the time, in particularly Rudolph Maté's Mississippi Gambler (1953) (source), and in its turn greatly influenced the implementation of colour in global cinema to come.
Jigokumon won two Academy Awards in 1955, for Best Costume Design and Best Foreign Language Film.
* the Bales 2025 Film Challenge for August is not date-related but lists, for the most part, the colours of the rainbow.
YasushiAkutagawa
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“I'm sharing my husband with a cat. This is humiliating!”
猫と庄造と二人のをんな [Neko to Shōzō to futari no onna / A Cat, Shozo, and Two Women] (Shirō Toyoda, 1956)
Feb
20
Love Your Pet Day
Shōzō (Hisaya Morishige) on the beach with his beloved cat Lily. DP: Mitsuo Miura.
Someone owns a pet on Love Your Pet Day (UK)
– Nakajima
Shōzō is torn between his ex-wife and his current spouse, but really just wants to spend time with Lily, his cat.