This is another adaptation of an Ariyoshi novel. It is an attempt to retell the heroic story of Hanaoka Seishu, a physician and pioneer of anesthetic surgery in the 18th century, from the perspective of women who devotedly sacrificed themselves to Seishu’s experiments. The Wife of Seishu Hanaoka, another good example of women’s films in the 1960s, directed by Masumura Yasuzo, also underlines a conflicting relationship between two women-daughter and mother-in-law.
 While the story seems to focus most on the jealous rivalry of the mother Otsugi (Takamine Hideko) and the wife Kae (Wakao Ayako) over Seishu, underlying this rivalry is Kae’s fascination with Otsugi: at the age of 8, Kae saw Otsugi, who instantly became the ideal image of womanhood for her, prompting her to marry and become her daughter-in-law. The intense competition between Otsugi and Kae is perfectly captured by Takamine and Wakao. What is more, the on-screen competition was heightened by the off-screen one: only 9 years senior to Wakao, Takamine had already established her incomparable reputation as a great actress after a brilliant career spanning 40 years, while Wakao, having begun her career as an idol, had been struggling for ten years to establish herself as an “actress”, not a “star”, under Masumura’s demanding direction. The concentrated performance of these two strong-willed actresses compellingly reveals that behind women’s self-sacrifice and devotion lies the rebellious nature of intricate emotional involvement and repression under patriarchy. (Saito Ayako)