Review: Fourth disc in the Teshigahara box set, 'The Man Without a Map' is the last of the collaborations with Abe, and the only included movie which was shot in widescreen. It is also the only movie in the set which is Region 2 and the only full-length movie which has no subtitles - Japanese or English.

In The Man Without a Map, Teshigahara examines again the role of the individual within society and the nature of identity through a realistic but increasingly surreal detective story. Unlike the stylishly attractive first three DVDs in the box set, The Man Without a Map looks every bit as seedy as Tokyo's underbelly could be expected to be, if not quite as seedy as it is described in the novel. Teshigahara also uses the camera to dissect and discombobulate scenes in an unsettling way which adds to the increasing tension as the detective's confusion increases and sense of identity decreases.

Although it was a delight to see a Teshigahara feature in widescreen ratio and in colour, I had the impression with this film, unlike the previous three, that Teshigahara was not yet completely comfortable with the his medium. The discombobulating effect which Teshigahara achieves by placing the camera so that the view is half-obscured by objects in the foreground may play a role in expressing the disorientation of the characters, and the same effect was used to good effect in The Face of Another, but here it seems clumsy some of the time and lacks the sharply stylized look that we are used to elsewhere from Teshigahara. Having read the book previously, I also felt that the completely surreal and chaotic drop into confusion expressed in the conclusion of the novel loses a lot in the translation to the screen. Further, although it is perhaps through unfair comparisons to contemporary movies which have greater visual effects at their disposal, unlike his powerful ending to The Face of Another with its crowds of faceless people, the end of The Man Without a Map seems weak and.normal. Having recently seen Memento on DVD, I also wondered if The Man Without a Map wouldn't have benefited from some first person narration - as written in the novel - to explain some of the detective's bizarre behaviour and his own increasing confusion.

For all the scenes which I felt suffered from the overly strong presence of Teshigahara hands in strangely framed shots, there were a lot of powerful or humorous scenes. One such favourite is a bizarre interlude in the movie where the hostess at a coffee bar turns up the radio and dances with her hands for a minute while the detective makes a call to his office to make a report and the coffee shop owner looks on. Given the serious nature of the story and the increasingly seedy turns that the story has taken, the hostesses' seemingly innocent minute of dancing juxtaposed with the detective's conversation is brilliant in its conception and is one of the strongest scenes in the movie.

The detective is played by Shintaro Katsu, an actor so prolific (as the blind swordsman, Zatoichi, amongst others) that despite the fact that I have seen relatively few Japanese movies produced before 1980 (Zatoichi included), I immediately recognized him in the role. His portrayal of the detective is without flaw, though I still found his powerful presence a bit of a surprise after reading the book, where, at least in the English translation, the detective seems a little bit more bookish and less physically imposing.

Toru Takemitsu is again responsible for music, and as with his work on The Face of Another, he combines his abstract atonal compositions with some catchy melodic songs, although this time his melodic arrangements are firmly planted in the 70s with organs, brass, and acoustic guitars.