| Title | The Most Beautiful (1944) |
| Runtime | 1 hr. 25 min. |
| Director | Akira Kurosawa |
| Country | Japan |
| Studio | Criterion Collection |
| Genres | Drama | Foreign Language |
| Description | This portrait of female volunteer workers at an optics plant during World War II, shot on location at the Nippon Kogaku factory, was created with a patriotic agenda. Yet thanks to Akira Kurosawa’s groundbreaking semidocumentary approach, The Most Beautiful is a revealing look at Japanese women of the era and anticipates the aesthetics of Japanese cinema’s postwar social realism. |