#87: Sansho The Baliff

Sansho The Baliff (Mizoguchi, 1954)

Sansho is the story of a governor of a small province who's thrown out of power for being too generous with his peasants. His wife and children are then kidnapped and sold into slavery. The wife is sold to a different owner than the children. The children spend ten years growing up as slaves, under false names, waiting for their opportunity to escape.

The story revolves around slavery and human trafficking in medieval Japan, but the focus of the story is whether you should maintain nobility of character, even when the consequences of that nobility are disastrous for you and your family. The father is noble to his peasants, and his family gets destroyed. Later his son is faced with the same dilemma. The moral is, it's important to always be principled at all costs.

The story is beautifully told with a lot of emotional nuance. It's an all around great film, if a little slow paced at times.

Rating: ***** / 5

79/101

Next: The Godfather, Persona