How to follow up one of the most scandalous art-house hits of all time? If you’re Japanese provocateur Nagisa Oshima, you do more of the same, but different. His followup to In the Realm of the Senses is a brooding and evocative ghost story about guilt and punishment set in rural Japan in 1895. It eschews pointless explicit imagery in favor of gorgeous compositions that are simultaneously realistic and stylized, a powerful fusion that gives the film a constant edge that gets sharper and sharper as the narrative drives the doomed characters closer to their fates. (DVD)