HAUNTED CASTLE (1969)


holds the viewer from beginning to end—which is atypical among the rest of the screen adaptations, and is all the more successful for it. Unfortunately, this film is not available in North America, but was released on Japanese DVD in 2004. Last, but not least, we have the mesmerizing KURONEKO


or, THE BLACK CAT (Nabu-no-naka-no Kuroneko, 1968), a beautiful masterpiece directed by Kaneto Shindo, who brought the unforgettable and unsettling ONIBABA (1964) to the screen. This variation on the theme finds a samurai’s mother and wife, raped and killed by those fleeing the battlefield, reincarnated into avenging cat creatures. They begin to stalk the gate to the town and lure their murderers, who are now important samurai, one by one, into their snare. When an honorable samurai is charged with dispatching the cat creatures he begins to find them strangely familiar. The atmospheric KURONEKO (shot in stunning black & white) was theatrically released by Janus Films in October 2010 and was issued on Blu-ray by The Criterion Collection in October 2011. For those curious about what Japanese Horror Cinema has to


offer beyond what we’ve been force-fed in the US, you might want to give this long-lived (nine lives, don‘cha know?) and traditional sub-genre a try. But, watch out—these pretty cat creatures haven’t been de-clawed.


August Ragone is the author of Eiji Tsuburaya: Master of Monsters (Chronicle Books) and maintains “The Good, The Bad, and Godzilla” at http://augustragone.blogspot.com


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