In Western cinema, Japan's Okinawa islands are usually shown as a World War Two battleground. In director Shohei Imamura's 1968 epic Profound Desires Of The Gods an altogether different conflict is being waged there - one between age-old primitive superstition and modern industrial progress.

Eighteen months in the making, the film is set on the fictional island of Kurage and centres on a Tokyo engineer (played by Imamura regular Kazuo Kitamura) who arrives to build a well for a sugar mill. This brings him into close proximity with Kurage's oldest family the Futoris, an inbred clan who are treated as outcasts by the rest of the inhabitants and dismissed as 'beasts' because of their adulterous and incestuous ways.

The Okinawa islands are regarded as being outside normal culture and closer to nature by the Japanese, so it was inevitable that the country's most anthropologically minded director would explore them on film. However, it was his fascination with localised mores that led to the production being dragged out over such a long period and resulted in critical accusations of self-indulgence when it failed at the box office. If you also consider Imamura's reputation as a director who sought to upset liberal middle-class values in any way possible, it's no wonder Profound Desires Of The Gods has been lost to most filmgoers for more than four decades.

This Masters Of Cinema release rescues the film from obscurity and on Blu-ray it looks truly stunning. The beauty and destructive force of nature - both life-giving and life-threatening - are presented in equal measure against the backdrop of a shimmering turquoise ocean. This was the first film Imamura made in colour and he utilises his new Cinemascope toy to show creation at its most vibrant, while also peering into the shadowy, murky areas where men and beasts are almost indistinguishable.

Profound Desires Of The Gods is occasionally surreal and frequently farcical (at times it resembles an exquisitely shot Carry On Wicker Man), but this whimsy is deceptive. As well as questioning Japan's relationship with its traditional past and ever-encroaching Western influences, the plot - which is seemingly content to meander like a yacht adrift in the Pacific for long stretches - suddenly sets a course for a very dark destination.

Profound Desires Of The Gods (Eureka! The Masters Of Cinema) is out now on Blu-ray.

Colin Houlson