Lightning (1952)
"Inazuma" (original title)

Director:

Mikio Naruse

Writers:

Fumiko Hayashi (novel), Sumie Tanaka

Stars:

Hideko Takamine, Mitsuko Miura, Kyôko Kagawa

5 wins.

Cast

Credited cast:
Hideko Takamine	...	Kiyoko
Mitsuko Miura	...	Mitsuko
Kyôko Kagawa	...	Tsubomi
Chieko Murata	...	Nuiko
Jun Negami	...	Shuzo
Eitarô Ozawa	...	Tsunakichi (as Sakae Ozawa)
Kumeko Urabe	...	Osei
Chieko Nakakita	...	Ritsu
Hisako Takihana	...	Tome
Kenzaburo Uemura	...	Ryuzo
Mariko Sugioka	...	Katsura
Osamu Maruyama	...	Kasuke
Rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Tadashi Date
Ken'ichi Miyajima	...	Old man at a bus
Nobuko Shingu

Storyline

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Plot Keywords:

one word title | mother daughter relationship | sister | based on novel

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Genres:

Drama

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Details

Country:

Japan

Language:

Japanese

Release Date:

9 October 1952 (Japan)

Also Known As:

Bliksem

Filming Locations:

Setagaya, Tokyo, Japan

Company Credits

Technical Specs

Runtime:

87 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

User Reviews

Families are a mixed blessing

This is about a fairly dysfunctional family: multiple fathers who seem to have left the scene and bickering adult siblings with problems. I scored this a bit low because I wasn't sure what was going on. One could see the big picture of sis trying to get out from under but otherwise, it seemed a mishmash of interactions which were fairly predictable and didn't take the plot anywhere.

It's well-shot and edited; Naruse always is; but without any evident direction, it's hard to stay engaged. I'm afraid I nodded off a bit, so perhaps I missed something, but it wasn't easy to stay focused when nothing much was happening. What there was was crashing great points without much subtlety; unusual for Naruse.