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Stars at Noon
Film
Film1983
The Ballad of Narayama
Directed by Shōhei Imamura
In a small village in a valley everyone who reaches the age of 70 must leave the village and go to a certain mountain top to die. If anyone should refuse they would disgrace their family. Old Orin is 69. This winter it is her turn to go to the mountain. But first she must make sure that her eldest son Tatsuhei finds a wife. From TMDB
28 reactions from 3 sources (Bluesky, TMDB reviews, Lemmy) · newest Sep 13, 2026 · last updated Oct 11, 2026 · How this works
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Sentiment labels for these sources are still being hand-checked; no score yet.
| Source | + | − | = |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bluesky * | 8 | 1 | 17 |
| TMDB reviews * | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| Lemmy * | 0 | 0 | 1 |
* shown, not counted in the score (label accuracy below our 85% bar or not yet audited).
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At a glance
The Ballad of Narayama is a 1983 drama film, directed by Shōhei Imamura, starring Ken Ogata, Sumiko Sakamoto and Tonpei Hidari.
- 26 people have posted about this film on Bluesky, TMDB reviews, Lemmy
- posts span Aug 6, 2023 to Sep 13, 2026
Assembled from TMDB, Wikidata and Steam fields and our own counts, nothing written by a model. Method
RottenBot@rottenbot · automated account
28 public posts have mentioned The Ballad of Narayama so far, but it needs 10 opinionated reactions from checked sources before it gets a score. Seen it? Post your take.
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Reactions
28 of 28 · most liked first#LetterboxdFriday #lastfourwatched 📽️ boxd.it/94Euv 1. The Ballad of Narayama – Survival as tradition, mercy as crime 2. Short Cuts – Altman unravels a whole city 3. The Remains of the Day – Repression, regret, perfect posture 4. Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster – Rubber suits, cosmic chaos
neutral · AI labelView post →#NowWatching THE BALLAD OF NARAYAMA (1983). Director: Shohei Imamura. Ken Ogata, Sumiko Sakamoto. Cannes Palme d'Or winner from Japan about village whose elders are taken away to die when they reach 70yo. First watch. #filmsky 📽
neutral · AI labelView post →I believe the first suicides were due to feeling like a burden because of old age or physical damage/disability. Like, there are a lot of disconnected myths about elderly traveling elsewhere to die. I recall watching japanese The Ballad of Narayama (1983) [wiki](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ballad_of_Narayama_%281983_film%29) about that this year, but I've heard folk stories and tales about such phenomenon since I was a slav child. I believe it started to happen when life of humans became…
neutral · AI labelView post →Watching The Ballad of Narayama (1958) rn and it's a good movie to watch if you wanna get mad at other movies for not looking as good
positive · AI labelView post →Tonight’s movie: The Ballad of Narayama (1983). Incredibly beautiful film, very bleak subject matter throughout. I imagine that combination was not accidental.
positive · AI labelView post →Went to a showing of The Ballad of Narayama at Japan House. Features snow, but definitely not a Christmas movie.
neutral · AI labelView post →Movie years project Year 1983 (97/122) Now Watching 📽️ #8/14 The Ballad of Narayama dir. Shohei Imamura rec'd by @staggerlee42.bsky.social, @lanius.bsky.social, @stevequick.bsky.social
neutral · AI labelView post →Kesiuke Kinoshita's The Ballad of Narayama (1958) is a film about complying in advance, that I suppose you could read as advocating acceptance of an inevitable fate, but you'd be wrong.
negative · AI labelView post →Second film of the night and 175th of the year, from my list of re-watches one each year 1930-2024, #NowWatching The Ballad of Narayama, 1983, Shōhei Imamura, Japan #filmsky 📽️
neutral · AI labelView post →Just finished reading this collection of Japanese stories 'The Old Man, the Wife, and the Archer'. Very interesting and surprising stories. Very happy to read the original story which inspired the movie 'The Ballad of Narayama'. #JapaneseLiterature vishytheknight.wordpress.com/2025/02/23/b...
neutral · AI labelView post →in the hopes of getting more good people such as yourselves to read this fine Letterboxd review of Shohei Imamura's (greatest?) film, THE BALLAD OF NARAYAMA, here's the link again but no preview card, which earlier was tagged for being disgusting smut by a robot letterboxd.com/sallitt/film...
neutral · AI labelView post →I tried watching that One Night Only movie but I stopped after the first 20 mins and randomly put on The Ballad Of Narayama. It’s possibly one of the greatest movies I’ve ever seen #filmsky
positive · AI labelView post →"The Ballad of Narayama" cstpdx.com/event/the-ba... Meet LAIKA animators, Portland tickets.omsi.edu/oregonmuseum... "Batman '66: The Movie" hollywoodtheatre.org/show/batman-... "Waiting for Godot" everout.com/portland/eve... "Tony", "Teen Sex & Death at Camp Miasma" www.cinema21.com
neutral · AI labelView post →Is there such a thing as a "slice of death" movie? The Ballad of Narayama, maybe? Itami's "The Funeral"?
neutral · AI labelView post →Good for you, Kyle. You reminded me of the Japanese film, "The Ballad of Narayama," which dramatized the practice of 'ubasute,' where elderly people were carried to a mountain to die.
neutral · AI labelView post →Each had certain aspects/strengths I found worthwhile though in a couple of cases the weaknesses tended to considerably drag the film down for me. I probably would say the Ballad of Narayama was my fave of the 7 for its brutal depiction of a life and society I found myself invested in.
positive · AI labelView post →West coast premier of "The Ballad of Narayama", Japanese film fans of #portland https://cstpdx.com/event/the-ballad-of-narayama-1983/ Lesbian Cinema Club nearly sold out https://tomorrowtheater.org/ Meet LAIKA creatives […] [Original post on mastodon.social]
neutral · AI labelView post →Oh hey, the Imamura version of The Ballad of Narayama is on there! It’s a stone cold masterpiece, and superior to the more well-known 1958 film, imo.
positive · AI labelView post →Oof, have you seen The Ballad of Narayama? It's a Japanese film about the practice of leaving elders to die once they reached their 70th year. Having taken many Asian content classes, it really is a poetic description of how a wealthy Confucian-Buddhist education could not be practised in poverty.
neutral · AI labelView post →My ★★★★★ review of The Ballad of Narayama (1983) on @letterboxd.social: boxd.it/eVGmLx
positive · AI labelView post →The polar opposite of The Ballad of Narayama 楢山節考, a Japanese movie about an ancient poor village with a sad tradition that the young would carry their elderlies up the mountain to leave them to die as a way to preserve resources. It's a sad lovely story. The great 1983 version won Palme d'Or.
neutral · AI labelView post →It’s been 43 years since I first saw The Ballad of Narayama. Haven’t seen a better film since; but I’m still watching, and there have been a few worth it.
positive · AI labelView post →My 4-star review of The Ballad of Narayama #filmsky
positive · AI labelView post →The (movie) The Ballad of Narayama (HD) is available today on (iTunes)(UK) for £3.99 Cast: Kinuyo Tanaka, Teiji Takahashi, Yûko Mochizuki, Seiji Miyaguchi, Eijirō Tōno, Ken Mitsuda Genre: (Foreign) Trailer & Reviews : www.rottentomatoes.com/m/narayama_b...
neutral · AI labelView post →#bestfilminlondontoday Apr 8 at capitalcelluloid.blogspot.com guide to London movies. 'harsh and beautiful 1983 film' THE BALLAD OF NARAYAMA in Japanese Golden Age season at Garden Cinema capitalcelluloid.blogspot.com/2024/03/capi...
neutral · AI labelView post →are you a fan of Sallitt? ( @sallitt.bsky.social) here's a double treat first off, THE BALLAD OF NARAYAMA letterboxd.com/sallitt/film...
neutral · AI labelView post →The short review is "life's a bitch, then you die" LOL, that doesn't do this absolutely brilliant film any justice, though. Imamura has crafted a rather sardonic, brutally honest mirror of humans. Like humans, it is both hard to watch, and simultaneously invokes emapthy. Few directors every achieve this level of mastery of the audience's emotions. It holds a well-deserved Palme d'Or. The legend upon which the movie is based is called Ubasute (姥捨て) in Japanese, or "abandoning an old woman".…
positive · AI labelView post →It's weird- I realize there are probably obvious visual references to Bergman and Dreyer, but the movie I kept thinking of was a Japanese film called the Ballad of Narayama from 1958, where everything is outdoors, but it's all on very stylized soundstages and feels like a weird dream as a result.
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