Machiko Kyō

"Quite simply one of the greatest of filmmakers," said Jean-Luc Godard of Kenji Mizoguchi. And Ugetsu, a ghost story like no other, is surely the Japanese director’s supreme achievement. Derived from stories by Akinari Ueda and Guy de Maupassant, this haunting tale of love and loss--with its exquisite blending of the otherworldly and the real--is one of the most beautiful films ever made.

In 8th century China as the Emperor grieves the death of his wife, the Yang family provides him a consort to consolidate its influence over the court.

In medieval Japan, four people offer conflicting accounts of a rape and murder.

In the midst of epic, violent intrigue in twelfth-century Japan, an imperial warrior falls for a lady-in-waiting; after he discovers she is married, he becomes frenzied in his attempts to win her love.

When her lover visits the mother of his child, a jealous actress plots revenge.