Name: Sandakan No. 8
Genre: Drama, History
Released: 1974
Duration: 122 min
Cast: Komaki Kurihara, Yoko Takahashi, Kinuyo Tanaka, Ken Tanaka, Masayo Umezawa

What Sandakan No. 8 Is About

Kei Kumai’s 1974 Japanese film adapts Tomoko Yamazaki’s 1972 book. A young woman researcher travels to Amakusa in Kyushu to study the lives of the karayuki-san: poor Japanese girls taken to Southeast Asia in the early twentieth century and forced into prostitution. There she meets an old woman who tells her about the years she spent at brothel number eight in Sandakan, in Borneo. The film treats this as a history at the intersection of colonialism and poverty, and never turns a single scene of it into a spectacle. Kinuyo Tanaka plays the old woman, and the film was nominated for the foreign-language Oscar. Komaki Kurihara plays the researcher and Yoko Takahashi the woman as a girl.

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Frequently Asked Questions

What is Sandakan No. 8 about?

Kei Kumai’s 1974 Japanese film adapts Tomoko Yamazaki’s 1972 book. A young woman researcher travels to Amakusa in Kyushu to study the lives of the karayuki-san: poor Japanese girls taken to Southeast Asia in the early twentieth century and forced into prostitution.

Where can I watch Sandakan No. 8?

Sandakan No. 8 is available to watch on digital platforms such as Criterion Channel. Current rent and buy options are listed in the "Where to Watch" section on this page.

How long is Sandakan No. 8?

Sandakan No. 8 runs for 122 minutes (2h 2m).

When did Sandakan No. 8 come out?

Sandakan No. 8 was released in 1974.

Who directed Sandakan No. 8?

Sandakan No. 8 was directed by Kei Kumai.

Who stars in Sandakan No. 8?

Sandakan No. 8 stars Komaki Kurihara, Yoko Takahashi, Kinuyo Tanaka, Ken Tanaka.

What is Sandakan No. 8's rating?

Sandakan No. 8 holds 7.5/10 on IMDb and 7.7/10 on TMDB. Its Pulse Score is 69 out of 100.