Synopsis
It’s 1940, and the population of Japan is divided over its entry into World War II. Satoko, the wife of a fabric merchant, is devoted to her husband but is beginning to suspect he’s up to something. Soon she allows herself to be drawn into a game in which she enigmatically conceals her intentions.
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Cast
- Yu AoiSatoko Fukuhara
- Issey TakahashiYūsaku Fukuhara
- Masahiro HigashideYasuharu Tsumori
- Ryota BandoFumio Takeshita
- Yuri TsunematsuKomako
- HyunriHiroko Kusakabe
- Takashi SasanoDoctor Nozaki
- Sakichi SatoStreet vendor
- Chuck JohnsonBob
- Maki Nishiyama
Recommendations
- 90
The Hollywood Reporter
Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s intriguingly titled Wife of a Spy (Spy no Tsuma) bookends the Second World War in an absorbing, exotic, well-paced thriller with moments of disconcerting realism and horror. - 80
Screen Daily
A film of sober elegance and control, Wife Of A Spy never quite delivers on the tautness of its build-up, but it is beautifully executed and features a number of teasingly ambivalent performances, notably from lead Yu Aoi. - 80
Variety
The film is a relatively unfamiliar fit for its prolific helmer, given its sharply evoked period milieu and restrained, classical storytelling. He wears it well: After a slowish start, Wife of a Spy unmasks itself as one of his most purely enjoyable, internationally accessible entertainments. - 75
The Film Stage
The protagonists of Wife of a Spy often act out of character, which all bodes efficiently well for the film’s slippery web of conceit, but ultimately quells a great deal of something the film is otherwise lacking in: feeling. It is, for my money, Kurosawa in low key; an interesting inclusion to a wonderfully idiosyncratic career. - 67
IndieWire
While this crisp and subdued Hitchcockian melodrama represents yet another unexpected pivot from a filmmaker who’s never liked putting one foot in front of the other (it’s Kurosawa’s first period piece), it’s also just a well-done slab of red meat from someone who hasn’t served up a satisfying meal in so long that it seemed as if he might’ve forgotten how.
