Movie Review: The Inugami Family

The Inugami Family (Japanese Movie)
Year of Release: 1976
Director: Kon Ichikawa
Based on the Book: The Inugami Curse by Seishi Yokomizo
Recommended for fans of: Gothic, Foreign Period Dramas, Eerie Mysteries, A touch of Horror, Brilliant Plot, Golden Age of Detective Fiction

Some time back, Words & Peace had recommended The Inugami Curse and I’d wanted to read the book ever since. I decided to take the shortcut when I accidentally discovered there was a subtitled movie adaptation too.

It’s a superb plot. The patriarch of the Inugami family clan dies, leaving behind several competing successors and a really crazy will. I don’t think it’s giving away spoilers to say that the will goes along the lines of “If A dies, B gets the property. If B dies, C gets the property….” It’s like the dreadful old man was setting them all up to murder, starting with A! Along the way there are some red herrings – the challenge is to identify which ones are red herrings and which ones are not.

The movie gets dark at times, but I still thought that this 1976 version by veteran director Ichikawa was quite carefully handled. There is some insight on Japan right after the World War II which too was handled sensitively. Based on other reviews, the movie seems to be true to the book (and might even have helped in removing the more annoying theatrical tendencies of the book).

However, I did feel that there was something missing in the way the plot reveal happened at the end. For a plot this intricate and suspenseful, there was something lacking in the way the murderer’s psychology was foreshadowed. The focus is definitely more on the plot and the technique, than on characterization. There’s one scene in the movie where the murderer claims to have been possessed by some unknown mad urge (the “curse” in question) – perhaps if that had been fleshed out more, then we would have a horror masterpiece on our hands.

Having binged on so much detective stuff, I thought I could guess the culprit – but right till the end, I was totally baffled. The howdunnit was as important as the whodunnit, and it took me a while after the movie to really grasp how the murders were orchestrated. It was a brilliant guessing game and there’s a strange eerie, gothic feel to the tale which just gives the creeps.

Rating: 9 of 10