When A Woman Ascends the Stairs (DVD)

"When a Woman Ascends the Stairs" might be Japanese filmmaker Mikio Naruse's finest hour—a delicate, devastating study of a woman, Keiko (played heartbreakingly by Hideko Takamine), who works as a bar hostess in Tokyo's very modern postwar Ginza district, who entertains businessmen after work. Sly, resourceful, but trapped, Keiko comes to embody the conflicts and struggles of a woman trying to establish her independence in a male-dominated society. "When a Woman Ascends the Stairs" shows the largely unsung yet widely beloved master Naruse at his most socially exacting and profoundly emotional.