Japanese widow settles life, climbs mountain to die. Criterion Collection Year 1958 Video Release 2013-02-05 Studio Image International Genre Drama MPAA Rating Not Rated Color Color Runtime 98 Animated Live-Action Full Synopsis This haunting, kabuki-inflected version of a Japanese folk legend is set in a remote mountain village, where food is scarce and tradition dictates that citizens who have reached their seventieth year must be carried to the summit of Mount Narayama and left there to die. The sacrificial elder at the center of the tale is Orin Ugetsu's Kinuyo Tanaka , a dignified and dutiful woman who spends her dwindling days securing the happiness of her loyal widowed son with a respectable new wife. Filmed almost entirely on cunningly designed studio sets, in brilliant color and widescreen, THE BALLAD OF NARAYAMA is a stylish and vividly formal work from Japan's cinematic golden age, directed by the dynamic Keisuke Kinoshita Twenty-four Eyes . Director Keisuke Kinoshita Cast Keisuke Kinoshita; Kinuyo Tanaka; Teiji Takahashi; Yuko Mochizuki