Based on the acclaimed novel by Kobo Abe and made for the relatively small sum of $100,000, this film had a great impact on Western audiences upon its release in 1964. An entomologist finds an attractive young widow living at the bottom of an enormous sandpit on a deserted beach. He becomes her prisoner, endlessly shoveling sand to avoid being engulfed. Teshigahara’s best-known film is a heavily symbolic erotic drama which effectively uses extreme close-ups until the characters become part of the landscape.