Set during Japan's Shogun era, this film looks at life in a samurai compound where young warriors are trained in swordfighting. A number of interpersonal conflicts are brewing in the training room, all centering around a handsome young samurai named Sozaburo Kano. The school's stern master can choose to intervene, or to let Kano decide his own path.
Takeshi Kitano Ryuhei Matsuda Tadanobu Asano Yoichi Sai Shinji Takeda Susumu Terajima Tomorowo Taguchi Yoji Tanaka Kei Satō Jiro Sakagami Eve Masatoh Yoshiaki Fujiwara Kenichi Urata Shun Sugata Yuji Yamazaki Usaburo Oshima Takashi Odajima Uno Kanda Kazuko Yoshiyuki Mami Nakamura Makoto Togashi Chikako Aoyama Koji Matoba Masa Tommies Masatô Ibu Katsura Zakoba Daisuke Iijima Yōichi Iijima Ito Yozaburo
Gohatto, Tabu, Gohatto: Tabu samurajů, Tabou, Gohatto Tabou, Tabù - Gohatto, Табу, טאבו, 고하토, Poslední samuraj, ტაბუ
Japan
USA
South Korea15세관람가
Japan
South Korea
USA
Basically what if Mizoguchi was like, super gay + Ms. 45 but the 'thriller' aspect inverted so it becomes a battle of motivations, plots and manipulations. Definitely a late work...like a late-late-late work
Ôshima's final film is a quietly constructed but ultimately powerful note to end his masterful career. It sits beside the other great final films that few auteurs have accomplished to close out their legacy with one of their best.
Taboo mixes two very different elements into a barrier breaking melting pot. The idea of homosexuality within the ultra masculine environment of the ancient Samurai warriors is something quite unheard of in all of the media portrayed of the period. The truth however would be very similar I believe to Mr. Ôshima's vision. As clear as it should be, homosexuality has probably been around since the beginning of man and not a product of the twentieth century like many seem to…
The Mizoguchi tributes are apparent even before it flat out references Ugetsu, but this is pure Oshima, that knife-edge balance of the serenely dispassionate and the chaotically sexual. Ryuhei Matsuda is perfect as the blank-eyed cipher whose good looks drive a regiment of samurai to horny ruin, so soft-spoken and passive that you don't quite clock the mounting number of lies and manipulations he tells until it's too late. Oshima shoots the various sparring matches with such patience that it takes a while to clock how well he uses them as an outlet for the battles of wits that regularly pit Kano against whatever peer or superior is currently attempting to woo him. And in the end, just a hilarious depiction of period-film homosexuality where being gay is not grounds for ostracism but making all the fellas too horny for discipline is.
As a Catholic school survivor I have a fondness for stories of queer desire in oppressive institutions. I also have a terrific compilation of gay samurai stories called Comrade Loves of the Samurai. Violently misogynistic in a Greek kind of way, I'm afraid, but I take queer history where I can find it.
Gohatto is a tragedy of doomed gay love, and while it's not my favorite approach to the subject, I'm also a bit of a miserabilist. I think this depiction works so well for me because it's genuinely effective as a tragedy and never feels manipulative or outright homophobic. If anything, it's too understated for its own good. The characters are certainly homophobic, even the gay ones, and…
being the object of unspoken lusts and gossip, your mere image disrupting the 'normal' structure of power. the spectre of homosexuality looms over every homosocial community, and the drive to exorcise it may in fact be the surest way to conjure a demon -- the fear of weakness and desire is the surest way to make yourself brittle and irrelevant.
The ethics of the samurai used to explore the sexuality of those in a repressive environment that leads to characters manipulating others to cope with their insecurities? Awesome stuff! Highly recommend!
A samurai training compound version of Beau Travail, where a beautiful young man, the object of every man’s desire, must choose between giving head or beheading.
Ōshima’s final film provides a subversive look at the social and moral codes of samurai culture in mid-19th century Japan, through a series of transgressions and the dissection of traditional masculinity. Gohatto—which, in English means ‘Taboo’—is the story of a young and handsome freshman samurai hopeful named Sōzaburō. Upon arrival, his meek demeanor and bonny appearance gain the sexual attention of fellow freshman Tashiro and soon, many others within the Shinsengumi. Homoeroticism and Jidaigeki haven’t ever been a common pairing (to the best of my knowledge) and yet Ōshima weaves these two subjects together seamlessly. He avoids judgment, cliché and, for the most part, any kind of problematic tone with regards to the queer themes of the film, from what I…
"Who have we here?"
The film embodies a nature all its own, or at least one that's emblematic of its acclaimed maestro. At times irregular and defiantly arcane, though often reflective and rather suspenseful, Gohatto (or Taboo) is a studiously constructed jidaigeki that remains thoroughly absorbing because of its elusive, esoteric qualities. Underscored by the always brilliant orchestrations of Ryuichi Sakamoto and anchored with performances in step with writer-director Nagisa Ōshima's particular artistic and human concerns, the experience is rife with both beauty and cataclysm.
You immediately notice that matters are already ablaze as the newly admitted Kanō ignites fierce passions among the ranks of the Shinsengumi during the latter years of the Tokugawa shogunate. The narrative's focus on sexuality…
I like beautiful stories. Don't you?
"Swordfighting", if you know what I mean. An accurate portrayal of what happens when you have that one guy in the friend group that's a little too good-looking. Guys being dudes. Okay, I got my jokey comments about the movie out of the way. I have no idea why I only found out about the existence of this movie earlier today. A homoerotic samurai film directed by Nagisa Oshima with music composed by Ryuichi Sakamoto is exactly the kind of thing that I'm looking for in storytelling. While not the masterwork that I was secretly hoping it would be going into this viewing, Taboo makes for a unique, slowly-paced and emotionally-driven samurai film. Now…
