Cinema
The Face of Another
他人の顔
Hiroshi Teshigahara · 1966
Synopsis
Okuyama, an engineer whose face was destroyed in an accident, lives with his head bandaged and feels rejected, beginning with his wife. A psychiatrist, Hira, reluctantly agrees to make him a mask so realistic that it cannot be told apart from a face. Okuyama rents an apartment without his wife's knowledge, puts the mask to the test, then sets out to seduce his own wife under a false name, according to Turner Classic Movies. A parallel story follows a young woman whose face was scarred by the Nagasaki bomb.
Context
The film adapts a novel of 1964, and it was the writer himself who wrote the screenplay; with the composer Takemitsu Tōru, the director and he made four films together. The architect Isozaki Arata designed the psychiatrist's office, with its glass partitions. Turner Classic Movies notes the sweeping, romantic music laid over clinical images, and a scene in a Bavarian bar where a Japanese singer sings in German. American critics were reserved, but the film is now counted among the major works of the decade.
Who it is for
About two hours, in black and white, and talkative: the mask is discussed as much as it is worn.
Prizes and reception
Released in Japan on 15 July 1966, then in the United States in 1967, it has since been reassessed by film historians.