Rashomon

Year: 1950

Grade: A

Country: Japan

Director: Kurosawa

Review

the first really big japanese film in america, and many peoples’ first introduction to kurosawa (myself included). at under 90 minutes it’s definitely a short film for kurosawa, but it feels longer because so much is explored. it’s an intensely layered film and as a result requires a couple viewings to really get into the nitty gritty issues that are explored. when i first saw it i thought it would be an interesting test of character – depending on which story you believed you would be a certain type of person. shrinks like to put people in groups so i figured this would be as good a way as any. ultimately i think the film is about questioning truth (that’s fairly evident), but the levels of storytelling and truth that are explored in the film make it a more difficult knot to untie. kurosawa tells us a story about a priest and a woodcutter who are telling a commoner a story about a bandit, a wife and a channel who are telling their versions of the same story. and in the case of the channel we have a woman who is supposedly acting as a medium for a dead man – so there is one more intermediary between a perceived reality and our hearing its rendition. if it sounds twisted, or seems twisted when you watch it then i think kurosawa did a good job. my interpretation is that truth and reality shift according to the person who experiences it and, thus, the more versions you have the more twisted it becomes. ultimately we must acknowledge the limitations of these things and, perhaps, focus on the future (as represented by the abandoned child in the end). the visual aspects of the film are both beautiful and affirming of its philosophy. the crime takes place in the forest and the camera is often behind trees or leaves which obstruct our view. acting styles differ depending upon who is telling the story. it’s just damn fine filmmaking. i don’t think this is kurosawa’s best film (though technically i don’t know that he gets much better), but it’s probably his most important film because of what it did for him, japanese cinema, and film in general. the commentary track had some good stuff, but i think it could have been a bit tighter and informative.