WEDDING RING / ENGAGEMENT RING (Lit.) (KONYAKU YUBIWA). Viewed on Streaming. Video restoration/preservation = eight (8) stars; cinematography = seven (7) stars; score = seven (7) stars; sound/looping = four (4) stars; audio restoration/preservation = one (1) star. Director Keisuke Kinoshita (also credited as the screenplay writer) offers up a triangular tale of unrequited love involving a wife (who has married well and now runs a large family-owned jewelry store in downtown Tokyo), her sickly husband, and a newly-minted doctor who is treating her husband. The plot revolves around whether or not the wife and the doctor will have an affair. To describe this tedious teasing story line as being quaint by today's standards is by far an understatement. The film is also way overlong to the point of further inducing audience indifference at about the halfway point. Some lead actors are miscast. Actress Kinuyo Tanaka is a bit too old for the role of the young wife (she looks the oldest of all the leads) and a little chubby to boot (her double chins are visible in some shots). Actor Toshirô Mifune turns in an amateur performance and clearly needs the expertise gained by having more films under his belt before tackling the doctor part (but he doesn't mumble!). Cinematography (narrow screen format, black and white) is fine with some good tracking shots (especially between rooms with separating walls removed). Subtitles/translations are okay. Signs and written text are translated. Restoration/preservation is both very good (video) and totally terrible (audio). It sounds like the audio track was completely ignored. Age deterioration noise and artifacts are ever present, very loud, and a major distraction (this is one of the worse sound tracks--if not the worse--I have encountered for a commercially re-released old movie!). Sound dubbing is hit and miss. There is no audio until the opening credits are over! Jumping into and splashing about in water (of which there are many scenes) are soundless. Score is way over the top and seems more appropriate for a major, sweeping epic. (Then again, the Director may be trying to inject some life into his limp film?) Avoid this creaking Shochiku programmer. WILLIAM FLANIGAN, PhD.
Review of Wedding Ring
