Suzuki sets the pace to slow, the narrative to allegorical nonsense, and creates about 1% of the visual flair I've come to expect. I am not interested.

This is the kind of surrealism I can really get into. Visually entrancing, and almost as impressive aurally, the only problem is I don't think it had enough good ideas to fill 2.5 hours and as such it seems to run out of steam during the second half.

"Suzuki retires the cumbersome plots and predictable settings of his genre films, and lends his bizarre, outrageous, and completely visual language to a bona fide art film." - John Behling

Atmospheric but confusing. Toshiya Fujita, apparently the director of "Lady Snowblood" and other movies, is quite good in the lead. There is probably a lot of cultural comment going on that I don't get, what with the one couple in Japanese dress and the other in Western suits. That said, it seems to drag in the middle quite a bit for me.

Tough to get through, mostly dull as dirt. Suzuki's films are often somewhat nonsensical, but they usually don't seem quite so aimless. And they're never so devoid of fun. Only occasionally did the movie engage my attention, and most of that was at the end. The rare bits of humor (mostly in the form of the blind beggars) were rather weak. I dunno, maybe I just wasn't in the mood for an art film. There were some great images here and there, though, just not enough to save the film.

Poetic. I can't say I really understood it, but I enjoyed it more than Kagero-za. I felt the subtle motifs Suzuki used to tie the narrative and images together were very effective, much like I would expect in a piece of music such as the piece after which this film is titled.