The Straits of Love and Hate

The Tolstoi novel, already filmed in Japan as KARUSHA in 1914, is a distant progenitor of this contemporary account.

Typical Mizoguchi weepy. The inn maid finds her affair with the manager is opposed by his parents. Separated, the girl is forced to give up her child but later, with her entertainer partner, retrieves it and returns to the snow bound inn.

The film making is sophisticated, particularly for the mid thirties, with the influence of the German Street Films evident. Strong imagery, composition in depth, long trackings, atmospheric interiors intercut with location shooting, where distant factory chimneys belch smoke.

Every so often direction tries too hard. This is not comparable to the fifties costume film trio.

A good copy of the Black and white original must have been impressive.