Song of the Cart (荷車の歌, Niguruma no uta) is a 1959 Japanese drama film directed by Satsuo Yamamoto.
[1][2][3] In Hiroshima Prefecture during the Meiji era, simple housemaid Seki accepts the proposal of Moichi, an educated mail carrier, who has decided to quit his job and save money for a warehouse by transporting goods with his wooden cart.
Seki's parents disown her for not asking for their approval, and also Moichi's mother, a widow, does not accept her as her daughter-in-law, treating her disdainfully.
The film follows Seki through familial and financial difficulties and her raising five children over the next 50 years, and ends with the post-war agrarian reform.
[2] Screenwriter Yoshikata Yoda, a frequent collaborator of director Kenji Mizoguchi, adapted Tomoe Yamashiro's 1956 novel of the same name, a notable post-war example of Japanese "peasant literature".