The Eel

After serving time in prison for murdering his unfaithful wife, Yamashita (Koji Yakusho, Perfect Days, Cure) is released on parole, accompanied only by his pet eel. Hoping to stay out of trouble, he takes over a rural barber shop that quickly becomes a gathering point for the eccentric locals. However, the discovery of a woman’s failed suicide starts a chain reaction that brings back past demons - and not just his own. The Eel won master filmmaker Shohei Imamura his second Palme d’Or, after 1983’s The Ballad of Narayama and was the breakthrough of its star Yakusho.

SPECIAL FEATURES

• High-Definition digital transfer of the 134-minute director's cut
• Digital transfer of the 117-minute theatrical cut
• Uncompressed mono PCM audio
• Interview with critic Tony Rayns (2024, 28 mins)
• Interview with screenwriter Daisuke Tengan (2024, 19 mins)
• Visual essay by Tom Mes on the year 1997 as a turning point in Japanese cinema (2024, 13 mins)
• Trailer
• Newly improved English subtitle translation
• Sleeve featuring newly commissioned artwork by Time Tomorrow

Year: 1997
Country: Japan
Cert: 18
Format: Blu-ray
Region: AB
RAD093BD
EAN: 5060974681792
Release date: 22/06/2026

Press:

"Riveting, wrenching... [director Shohei Imamura] marshals a small cast of vivid characters that enable him not only to bare the passions that seethe beneath the orderly surface and apparent conformity of Japanese life but also to ponder emotions and issues that know no nationality” - Lawrence van Gelder, The New York Times