Firstthird

This is one of those films that is difficult to rate because it falls into a weird category: the good bad film. Some films that are bad by conventional standards nevertheless manage to be aesthetically pleasing, maybe because the filmmaker’s passion, or vision, or drive, comes through in spite of things like poor production values and narrative gaps. Western examples include cult classics like Ed Wood’s “Plan Nine From Outer Space.” “The Snake Girl and the Silver Haired Witch” has better production values than “Plan Nine” but still, by 1968 standards, is a bit sub par, with rubbery snakes that aren’t very frightening at all and some unconvincing special effects which still manage to convey a fun kind of wackiness, especially in some of the dream sequences which involve snakes, swords, and lots of swirling vortexes. It has heart, and that heart helps explain why it has a cult following. The story is focused on a young girl who has been raised in a religious orphanage but is finally reunited with her family once they figured out that she had been switched as a baby with another infant. What happened to the other infant, and how that relates to the girl, forms a central element in the plot. Don’t expect to really be frightened, but do expect a good time.

One interesting fact is that a bit part, that of the taxi driver, is played by Umezu Kazuo who was a famous manga artist and who also wrote the short stories that inspired the film.