This is a fairly strange little film in that it's surprisingly hard to pin down what genre it is. Maybe that's not a bad thing, because even if it makes the movie hard to explain, it does lead to the feeling of seeing something you haven't seen before.

I guess at its broadest, the film follows two blind masseurs (neither are samurais, unlike their fellow cinematic blind masseur, Zatoichi. They end up at a remote resort in the mountains, and encounter various other characters whose lives they all get mixed up in.

For a movie that's only just over an hour long, it really does feel like there are a ton of characters. Maybe not too many, but you do have to get a handle on them all pretty quickly.

Otherwise, it's a decently good watch. It looks nice and has a premise where you're never quite sure what's coming next. There's an element of mystery to the film, but it seems pretty minor overall, with the film more focused on character interactions, light comedy, and some dramatic moments here and there.

Japanese cinema pre-WW2 is very interesting, and completely unlike the films that came after WW2 (the divide is far more noticeable than say pre-WW2 American films versus post-WW2 American films). For any fans of old Japanese movies, The Masseurs and a Woman is probably worth your time, especially because when it comes to time, it doesn't take up very much of it.

Some background information is necessary to understand the plot. In Japan, traditionally masseurs were blind men--it gave them work and patrons didn't need to feel embarrassed around them. In the Zatoichi series, the leading man (Ichi) makes a living by giving massages...and gambling on the side. Here in THE MASSEURS AND A WOMAN, the film begins with two blind men on their way to a resort town in the north. It seems that these blind masseurs move from resort to resort depending on the season--to the north in the summer and to the south when winter arrives.

This film has nice cinematography and technically is a nice film, but the plot is a bit thin. Here it is in a nutshell: The film shows the two masseurs during the course of their work days. The younger masseur meets a nice young lady from Tokyo and he's smitten with her. However, over the course of several days he thinks he's discovered her dark secret. While she is hiding something, it's nothing like this normally perceptive blind man imagines. That's really all there is to it. Even compared to a Ozu film, this Hiroshi Shimizu film seems very, very, very simple. Well made, but very simple...and not all that exciting to watch. Is it worth seeing? Perhaps, but it does not fall in the category of "must see".