Taira Clan Saga

Twelfth-century Japan. The Taira are a warrior clan and the court looks down on them, caught as they are between the imperial circle, the armed monks of the Buddhist monasteries and the rival Minamoto. Young Kiyomori is trying to raise his clan's standing and at the same time to answer a question about his own parentage. Kenji Mizoguchi's 1955 film comes from Eiji Yoshikawa's novel version of the Tale of the Heike. It is one of only two films he made in colour, the other from the same year. Kazuo Miyagawa shot it. This is a political film rather than a sword film: religion, aristocracy and the military arranging themselves against one another. Raizō Ichikawa plays Kiyomori.