An Actor's Revenge

An Actor's Revenge (Yukinojo Henge) was directed by Kon Ichikawa, one of the major figures of Japan's golden age of cinema. It stars Kazuo Hasegawa, who reprised the same role he had played in the original 1935 film version directed by Teinosuke Kinugasa, making it a remarkable case of an actor playing the same character 28 years apart.

The film follows Yukinojo, a celebrated kabuki onnagata (a male actor who specializes in female roles) who travels with his troupe to Edo, where he methodically orchestrates the ruin of three men responsible for his father's death years earlier. Using manipulation, seduction, and psychological warfare, Yukinojo's elaborate revenge scheme unfolds against a vivid Edo-period backdrop.

Yes, Ichikawa's 1963 film is a remake of the 1935 film The Revenge of Yukinojo (Yukinojo Henge), directed by Teinosuke Kinugasa and also starring Kazuo Hasegawa. The 1963 version is distinguished by Ichikawa's bold visual style, including expressionistic use of color, theatrical framing, and a modern jazz-inflected score by Yasushi Akutagawa, which gives the Edo-period story an anachronistic edge.

An onnagata is a male kabuki actor who specializes in playing female roles, a tradition that originated because women were banned from the kabuki stage in 17th-century Japan. In An Actor's Revenge, the protagonist Yukinojo is an onnagata whose theatrical skill at portraying women—and manipulating men—directly fuels his ability to carry out his revenge, making the onnagata identity both his art and his weapon.