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esteeb.art · @esteeb.art@bridge.neodb.net

Rated Onibaba 9/10

Really trippy mediation on how war affects people. So often you see people talk about how war reduces people to beasts but that metaphor is usually reserved for the people fighting it. <i>Onibaba </i>goes a different way and focuses on the people left behind by war. Presents women and elderly and the cowardly able bodied men as sort of ambush predators, parasites and scavengers. A simple story about jealousy and survival looks as much like a cautionary folktale as it does watching a nature documentary. The way they skulk about in the tall grass, the way their eyes gleam and narrow when they see someone they identify as prey, the way they eat, even in their inability to suppress their more basic sexual instincts, it’s clear that the world of this movie has rendered its people into something else, something inhuman and it’s the men arbitrarily making war who are to blame. Great acting, great lighting, oozing with atmosphere and dread, so grounded and unflinching while still feeling somehow supernatural and dream like. Gets more visual milage out of its characters faces and some swaying grass than most get with way more. Obviously a huge influence on our more recent crop of “elevated horror” and a must watch for anyone who’s into that sort of thing. <b>Fantasy Double Feature With: </b><i>The Lighthouse</i> Robert Eggers loves this movie or I’ll eat my hat.

#criterion challenge 2026 #cc2026 #movie

Published 2026-01-27 00:00 UTC · bridged from Atmosphere