While the foggy weather with it's ice bushes has led to bunkering in for the evening with
The Lord of the Rings trilogy, last night was all about the brilliant (and apparently underrated)
The Face of Another, by master Japanese filmmaker
Hiroshi Teshigahara. Stylishly shot in 1960s urban Japan (some of the characters dress as if they inhabit the same Madison Avenue fashion world as
Mad Men), it explores the life of identity through a factory worker who is horribly disfigured in an accident. Ashamed of his appearance and believing that his wife no longer desires him, he seeks out the aid of an experimental surgeon who fashions him a mask with which he sets out to seduce his wife.
On the one hand, the movie explores themes of identity and individualism during an age where the pressure to conform was great, but it also deals with responsibility and restraints that comes with the accountability of a public identity.
