Dojoji Temple (1976) (2024)

Popular reviews

• Review by theironcupcake ★★★★★ 6

  THE PILGRIMAGE TO KUMANO
  SHELTER
  HIS EXCUSE
  PASSION
  THE HIDAKA RIVER
  THE GREAT BELL

  Women Film Editors #225: Hisako Aizawa

  Sometimes stop-motion puppetry can reveal more about human nature than flesh-and-blood figures ever could.

  How many among us have lit up at the temptations of seemingly shared desires, only to be pushed away instead? Do we not fear the possibility that we may be unlovable, perceived and rejected as monstrous like the lonely woman here? Her dragon form burns from a fire within, but these flames are not born of rage; they ignite from pure sorrow, tender as the tears that leave her as she morphs her torment into ashes and dust.

  Sometimes despair is unavoidable, whether the demon is…

• Review by Dr. Ethan Lyon ★★★★★ 1

  1st Kihachirō Kawamoto

  Cor blimey, this is a bit of alright. Puppetry here gives Starevich a real run for his money but edges ahead in my opinion for the use of Bunraku. This classic form of Japanese puppet theatre is brought to unnerving life by Kawamoto's sense of timing, utilising the filmic language of closeups and dissolves to create an eerie rhythm and oncoming dread. The story is simple enough; a pilgrim meets a mysterious woman who he spends a night of passion with. When she wants more from him, he rejects her, sparking off a chain of terrifying events that climax in a Buddhist temple. Along with the beautiful and unsettling puppets (which are Uncanny, to be sure), the…

• Review by Cinema_Strikes ★★★½

  Shocktober 2023 # 17 (list here)

  Fascinating. Short horror fable about a traveling priest who unwisely finds himself mixed up with a strange woman, told in a combination of stop motion using Bunraku puppets and traditional hand drawn animated backgrounds and effects in the style of classical Japanese painting. Utterly unique visual style.

  You can find it here.

  Thanks for pointing this one out, theironcupcake.

• Review by evilbjork ★★★½

  Without any dialogue, this short tells the story of passion and obsession. It mixes 2D animation with puppets in a way I haven't seen done before. The puppets at times are shown actually walking around on 2D paintings. It's heavily expressive, as you would expect for a story with no spoken words, so expressive certain parts caught me completely off guard with their intensity. For much of it we can only hear the loud, harsh winds over ominous music which creates a threatening atmosphere. It's amazingly well done. It's like a puppet show for adults. It's a wild experience and worth a watch.

• Review by Phoebe ★★★★

  The story is about an overly attached obsessive unrequited lover bordering suicide. How's that for a mouthful?

  This stop motion film is a genuine aesthetic art of the Japanese. The exquisite puppetry very well executed the traditional Noh play.

• Review by Brian 🦇

  The bunrakupuppetry is beautiful and stunningly expressive all on its own but it’s the interaction with the hand-animated scroll painting elements that really vault this to another level for me. Quite exquisite rhythms and effectively ambivalent sympathies despite the parabolic good-and-evil dichotomy

• Review by Jimmy ★★★½ 3

  Great puppet work and well decorated backgrounds, darker than I expected in such a good way. Should really be tagged as fantasy.

• Review by Mike ★★★★★

  Kihachirō Kawamoto may soon end up as one of my favorite directors. His puppets have a life of their own and his stories seem to be coming alive off of the ancient scrolls

• Review by satria. ★★★★★

  bagus banget anjir, tapi kasihan cewenya walaupun dia siluman naga huhu, nangis gua.

  nonton disini

• Review by Mazinkaiser ★★★★

  These Robot Chicken shorts are getting classy

• Review by Leon Staton ★★★★

  Jiri Trnka: meet Mr. Kawamoto.

  That's largely how it went, too. Kihachiro Kawamoto never bothered with puppet animation before he met the Czech master, and he didn't create too many animated shorts after he began his new, middle-aged career. But short films like Dojoji Temple are not to be underestimated—after all, it takes preparation and a mature sense of direction to scare the living daylights out of someone with artificial actors. There are reasons why Thunderbirds feels so tongue-in-cheek to this day and why this Kawamoto tale shall retain its dramatic relevance for years to come; I'll admit, of course, that Thunderbirds is awesome and, like the best TV shows, knows what it's doing.

  I'll make the same case for…

• Review by billhsu ★★★½

  Here: www.dailymotion.com/video/x701aa