Manji

Yasuzo Masumura's 1964 film adapts Junichiro Tanizaki's 1928 novel Quicksand, from a screenplay by Kaneto Shindo. Sonoko, a bored married woman, is drawn to Mitsuko, a young and beautiful fellow art student; as the relationship grows, both women's partners are pulled in, and it becomes a four-way machinery of jealousy, blackmail and suicide. Ayako Wakao's Mitsuko keeps blurring the line between object of desire and manipulator. Masumura renders Tanizaki's story of obsession and destruction in a cold, sharp register; there is no melodrama, no psychological explanation, only what these people do to each other. The novel was filmed four more times afterwards, but this first adaptation remains the most cited. Treating desire between women this openly was notable for Japan in 1964. Who it's for: viewers who like the 1960s wave of Japanese cinema, Tanizaki adaptations and stories of toxic entanglement. Who it's not for: anyone avoiding content involving suicide and manipulation, or expecting someone to hold onto.