Kurosawa tribute-recommendations?

[charliechaplinfan]

I know this is the Kurosawa tribute thread but I can't think of Kurosawa without thinking of Toshiro Mifune. From the gangster in Drunken Angel to the doctor in Red Beard and everything he did inbetween, he's one of the screen's best actors.

[JackFavell]

Also in Hell in the Pacific with Lee Marvin.

[Mr. Arkadin]

Arkadin, is that a new avatar?

Yeah, it's from some film in your possession with Jeff Bridges.

[JackFavell]

I had a sneaking suspicion that's what it was.... you are sending me subliminal messages...I'm gonna watch it this week! I promise!!!!

[Mr. Arkadin]

I actually changed it to show my support for Jeff Bridges winning his long overdue Oscar. I usually change my avatar once a month because:

A: I get bored with the same old thing.

B: It's a nice way to promote actors or films I enjoy.

I will say this pic has probably generated the most response I've ever gotten (Mr. Klondike also remarked on it in the Contempt thread). I guess it's a good thing I didn't post the other J.B. pic I found from the movie (shirtless w/open jeans)!

Red Beard will be showing next week. I had an old thread about the movie here the last time it showed:

http://silverscreenoasis.com/oasis3/vie ... f=1&t=3414

I also recommend High and Low (1963), which shows the same night. This film is one of my favorite noirs and was represented on my list of Favorite 25 Noir Films we did at TCM a couple of years ago.

P.S. You owe me an email whenever you do get around to that!

[MissGoddess]

I haven't gone through all the posts yet, and I'm not up to jumping full throttle into Kurosawa, but I will say he is the one foreign language director I am mOST interested in exploring. i was so UPSET that I missed recording IKIRU, which is the one of his I am most into seeing. I did watch the last 3/4, and was terribly moved by it. Loved it. He has such heart. Wonderful. I saw about 40 minutes of THRONE OF BLOOD, too. I'm interested in seeing his version of Dosteyevsky's THE IDIOT (I forget Kurosawa's title). I love that story and I bet he's great at interpreting it.

I will probably end up getting either the DVD set or IKIRU separately.

[Mr. Arkadin]

Hi Miss G. Every title is worth recording and I really think you would be entranced by all the stories--we're just splitting hairs over favorites. Here is next week's line up:

The Bad Sleep Well (1960)
A man seeks revenge by marrying the daughter of his father's enemy.
Cast: Toshiro Mifune, Takeshi Kato, Masayuki Mori, Takashi Shimura Dir: Akira Kurosawa BW-151 mins, TV-14

High And Low (1963)
Kidnappers mistake a chauffeur's son for the child of a wealthy businessman.
Cast: Toshiro Mifune, Tatsuya Nakadai, Kyoko Kagawa, Tatsuya Mihashi Dir: Akira Kurosawa BW-143 mins, TV-14

Red Beard (1966)
A tough doctor takes a young intern under his wing.
Cast: Toshiro Mifune, Yuzo Kayama, Yoshio Tsuchiya, Terumi Niki Dir: Akira Kurosawa BW-185 mins, TV-MA

I Live In Fear (1955)
An elderly industrialist's fear of nuclear warfare leads his family to accuse him of insanity.
Cast: Kiyomi Mizunoya, Kamatari Fujiwara, Takashi Shimura, Toshiro Mifune Dir: Akira Kurosawa BW-103 mins, TV-PG

Scandal (1950)
A tabloid report tries to turn a singing star's friendship with a young artist into an illicit romance.
Cast: Yoko Katsuragi, Yoshiko Yamaguchi, Toshiro Mifune, Noriko Sengoku Dir: Akira Kurosawa BW-105 mins, TV-PG

As you can see, all these films star Toshiro Mifune, which as Alison noted, is reason alone to see them. The first two are excellent noirs, while Red Beard is a humanistic epic (three hours!) like Ikru. Although I Live in Fear and Scandal end up in courtrooms, they are really works of paranoia and fear of domination, which were important issues in Japan at that time.

[MissGoddess]

Sound like a line-up I will enjoy, Arkadin. Thank you, I will have my DVR ready. The Bad Sleep Well---I recently read an article on that one and I'm very much looking forward to it.

[Mr. Arkadin]

A bump for tonight's showings. Lots of variety tonight, so hopefully you'll find something to tickle your fancy.

[MikeBSG]

There is a book that covers both the life of Kurosawa and the life of Mifune. It is called "The Emperor and the Wolf," (I can't remember the author now) but I highly recommend it.

Anyway, he made the point that "Red Beard" is the Kurosawa movie most popular in Japan. It is the last film Kurosawa made with Mifune.

[MissGoddess]

I liked THE BAD SLEEP WELL. It made me giggle a little to see the plot unwind about corruption and bid rigging in the construction industry, as New York City's general contractors are once again under a big spotlight investigation for the same. Some things never change, no matter where or when.

Boy, does this movie give "beaurocrat" a dirtier connotation than ever. It's like the old Shogun ways never really changed, the setting was just transferred to modern corporate politics. Nothing has changed there either. I like the satirical opening at the uber-Westernized wedding reception that was just an ill-disguised corporate banquet to celebrate a merger. And how the cake came out to the strains of Mendelsohnn's "Wedding March" with that bunch of young execs looking on like they were watching a play (they even refer to it as a play---I didn't see them again afterward, and I missed the very first scenes so I'm not sure who they were...underlings?)

Kurosawa really took a sharp sword to modern Japanese culture, I can see that already.

[charliechaplinfan]

There is a book that covers both the life of Kurosawa and the life of Mifune. It is called "The Emperor and the Wolf," (I can't remember the author now) but I highly recommend it.

Anyway, he made the point that "Red Beard" is the Kurosawa movie most popular in Japan. It is the last film Kurosawa made with Mifune.

Thanks for that recommendation

[Mr. Arkadin]

The Bad Sleep Well, High and Low, and Red Beard were great choices not only in content, but also in the order they were shown, as they present Kurosawa's philosophy of good and evil.

In The Bad Sleep Well (which has interesting ties to Hamlet), the protagonist tries to fight evil by becoming evil and fails. High and Low shows good and evil as polar twins, while Red Beard proposes the idea that the best defense against evil is not to struggle with it, but instead be a creator of good.

[JackFavell]

I am so disappointed. I missed the first half hour of The Bad Sleep Well, then when I settled down to watch, I could not figure out what was going on, and it really scared me ...

Then I fell asleep and missed every blessed movie. I feel bad, and I slept well.

[Mr. Arkadin]

You know what your penance is.