Apparently everyone who got the Onibaba reference can't hold back their excitement over this film. Unfortunately, the mask is just about the only thing that lifts it out of the doldrums. There are three speaking parts here, of which only two characters are actively involved in the so-called plot; their involvement is limited to screaming at each other in whiny voices when the director wants one of them to leave the otherwise uneventful scene. Sometimes the man leaves to let the girl prowl around the old dark house; then it's the girl's turn, and she leaves to give him the chance to do his own prowling undeterred. Some tracking shots would have been moody if there were anything here to be moody about. And I don't think the director himself knows exactly what happens at the very end (or, in fact, in the few middle bits where anything does happen - e. g., what is the significance of the doll that the protagonist eventually takes to bed? what do the children burn? I don't much care, but it would be nice to know it wasn't all just completely off the wall).