Lost for 45 years until it was rediscovered by Kinugasa in his storehouse in 1971,[3][4] the film is the product of an avant-garde group of artists in Japan known as the Shinkankakuha (or School of New Perceptions) who tried to overcome naturalistic representation.

The elderly custodian stares at a mentally ill woman held inside a cell, who is revealed to be his wife, but she does not recognize him due to her condition.

Later the janitor is shown once again mopping the floors of the asylum, no longer able to visit his wife's ward because he lost the keys (picked up by the doctor).

"School of new perceptions" (or sensations)) and is considered the first film of a stillborn "neo-sensationist" current, but shows influences of German expressionist cinema.

Turner Classic Movies aired the George Eastman House Archives print of the film in 2016, using a score by the Alloy Orchestra.

[8] The Japanese Avant-Garde and Experimental Film Festival hosted a screening on 24 September 2017 at King's College, London, with a live musical score and an English narration by benshi Tomoko Komura.

[29] CAMERA JAPAN, a yearly Japanese cultural festival based in the Netherlands, featured a screening of the film with live musical accompaniment as part of its 2017 lineup.

[32] The Alloy Orchestra also provided the score for a screening at the Lincoln Center in New York City,[2] and for the aforementioned DVD release of the film.

[37] Techno band Coupler was commissioned by the National Museum of Asian Art in Washington, DC to create and perform a new score to accompany the film's screening on 5 May 2023.

Dennis Schwartz from Ozus' World Movie Reviews awarded the film a grade A, calling it "a vibrant and unsettling work of great emotional power".

[44] Jonathan Crow from Allmovie praised its "eerie, painted sets", lighting, and editing, calling it "a striking exploration of the nature of madness".

[45] Nottingham Culture's BBC preview of the film called it, "a balletic musing on our subconscious nightmares, examining dream states in a way that is both beautiful and highly disturbing.

"[46] Jonathan Rosenbaum of The Chicago Reader praised the film's expressionist style, imagery, and depictions of madness as being "both startling and mesmerizing".