Why do so many great filmmakers, true masters of their genre, produce so much drivel in their later years? I am thinking of late Bunuel, Fellini, Antonioni, and now, regrettably, Imamura. It has only been four years since Imamura directed a truly marvelous film, "The Eel," and three years since the sublime "Dr. Akagi." Now we have the embarrassment of "Warm Water under a Red Bridge," in which realism and surrealism become intertwined and in which what some might view as the sublimity and sagacity of a great director's later years might appear more like an output of his dotage. If you admire Imamura and are a connosseur of his earlier and great films, save yourself the discomfort of watching this sad spectacle and go out and rent "The Ballad of Narayama." Or "The Eel."
Review of Warm Water Under a Red Bridge
