Directed by Shohei Imamura • 1968 • Japan
Starring Kazuo Kitamura, Rentaro Mikuni, Choichiro Kawarasaki

In many ways the ultimate expression of director Shohei Imamura’s vision of a world ruled by elemental instinct and chaos, this stunning, visually ambitious epic follows Kariya (Kazuo Kitamura), an engineer from Tokyo, as he arrives on a remote island populated by the strange, inbred Futori family, who draw him into their primeval world of superstition, mysticism, and ritual. Filmed over eighteen grueling months that pushed Imamura to the brink, PROFOUND DESIRE OF THE GODS astounds with images of shocking, hallucinatory power.