Enjo [is] a beautifully made and moving film….

Its construction, far from being slack, is an intricate nest of flashbacks…. The procedure is not in the least original (there is an obvious and close parallel with [Welles's] Citizen Kane), but Ichikawa handles it so deftly that it seems neither artificial nor confusing, and in the end it proves to be justified.

Ichikawa tries a little too hard to squeeze significance out of the characters surrounding Goichi. Some of them are types (though not, to Western eyes, stereotypes), unchanging from scene to scene….

Most of the flaws in the construction and characters of Enjo are neutralized by the film's sheer visual integrity…. The photography is designed not for virtuosity but for aptness. The compositions within the side Daieiscope format are balanced without seeming calculated. The lighting of the interiors is often low-key without melodramatically pitting pools of light against...