Probably a top contender for most deranged marriage depicted in a film, Under the Blossoming Cherry Trees is a top-notch folktale horror movie about derangement, superstition, obsession, and of course, good ole fashioned marital strife. If Hausu is the pinnacle of 1970s Japanese horror, then this movie is it's more quiet, restrained, but equally deranged older sibling.
At the opening we get a shot of the cherry trees in modern day, and people under them and enjoying the shade and pleasant view they provide, until a child's voice, tells us that the trees used to be feared hundreds of years ago, and would induce madness in those that walked under them, which then transports us to Edo era of Japan, and the madness begins. A beautifully shot, colorful madness, but madness nonetheless.
Tomisaburô Wakayama, who played Ogami Itto in Lone Wolf and Cub, gives a very quiet and unsettling performance, and is nothing like Ogami Itto aside from the decapitations he gets to do very frequently. He is simultaneously pathetic and threatening, as it's difficult to reason with a man who eventually decapitates so many people that he grows bored of it, and does it solely to satiate his wife's growing appetite for heads to do... things with. I think you can guess what she gets out of some of them. Her manipulation of an already gruff and wild man is a sight to behold, and there's an interesting power play in their relationship. She is very clearly in control of him, which would obviously be not very common in this era of Japan's history. But this is not a very common movie. We get to see their relationship evolve from captor and captive, to parasite and host, to maybe, truly in love with each other. Then there is the ending. The less said, the better. But it is truly shocking and visually jaw-dropping. Definitely a unique piece of Japanese horror to say the least, and would make for great post-midnight viewing.
