The Sinners of Hell (1960)

"In the end, all must die"

Jigoku aka The Sinners of Hell was one trippy, surreal tale of the afterlife. Even stranger were the events that caused people to be thrown into the Eight Hells of Fire and the Eight Hells of Ice.

Late one night Tamura and Shiro are driving home when a drunken pedestrian steps out in front of them. Tamura refuses to go back and check on the man believing no one has seen them. He would be wrong. Two women plot their murderous vengeance in the shadows. Shiro’s conscience gets the best of him and he decides to turn himself in. This decision leads to more deaths and a boatload of people forced to cross the River Styx or in this case, the River Sanzu. Enma, the King of Hell, was far from benevolent.

I thought during the first half of this film that Shiro was already in The Bad Place because the number of murders grew hilariously exponentially. I tried writing the names down of the dearly departed and realized it was a futile effort. The writer seemed to be showing the many ways people are complicit with murder without actually driving a knife through someone’s heart. The perpetrators just all happened to converge at the same place and time. The clues about Tamura led in the wrong direction without ever making sense. For me, the first half was frustratingly bad.

The second half of the film delved into the excruciating and vile punishments inflicted on humans who had not been kind or who had committed murder. Or who had apparently been physically adjacent or knew of the actions. Too many of the damned didn’t make sense to me. Babies being tortured or family members who didn’t commit the egregious action. And why does being in a car crash make you responsible for another passenger’s death when you weren’t the driver or dying in the car crash is enough to send you south? The trials made The Good Place’s “bees with teeth” and “penis flatteners” seem tame. Modern horror fans may laugh at the simple techniques, but I still found different tortures stomach churning.

Jigoku took a pessimistic view of humankind and all the ways people’s selfish actions lead to the deaths of others. And also, the inventive ways those same people were tortured for their transgressions. A highly stylized film, it was artistically interesting to watch. As far as enjoyment, it could be painful and as memorable as a swim in a pool of gurgling filth.

30 October 2025
Trigger warnings: Impalements, dismemberments, fire, snakes, and an assortment of other tortures.

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