Review of A Mad Page — A Film Not About Madness, but About a ‘Gaze Trapped Inside Madness
Japan, 1926.
This film came out at a time when cinema itself had not yet fully settled as a medium, and even today, it feels strange.
No, more precisely, it feels uncomfortable.
It is not simply because of the worn-out feeling unique to old black-and-white silent films.
From the beginning, this is a film that has no intention of letting the audience watch comfortably.
A Page of Madness
The original title is 《狂つた一頁》. In Korea, it is usually translated as 《A Crazy Page》.
The director is Teinosuke Kinugasa.
Yasunari Kawabata, who would later receive the Nobel Prize in Literature, also participated in the screenplay.
Plot
The setting is a closed psychiatric hospital.
A man works there as a handyman.
There is only one reason.
Because of his wife, who is locked behind bars.
In the past, his wife jumped into water with their child and then lost her mind. The husband believes he is the cause of it. It is because of guilt. He gets a job at the hospital almost as if sneaking in, lingering near his wife.
But his wife does not recognize him.
The patients inside the ward dance, laugh, cry, and suddenly turn violent.
Some keep repeating the same movements, while others stare into empty space.
The man tries to esc