The Movie Thread

[Eisenwurst]

[vienna]

Originally Posted by tmccarthy

One of Kurosawa's finest films; he had fallen on hard times since Japanese film studios were wary of Kurosawa's penchant for wanting full control over his films, never a selling point for studio head bean-counters, and, in despair of ever being able to direct again, he attempted suicide; MosFilm, the USSR film studio, heard about Kurosawa's troubles and also heard about Kurosawa's expressed interest in filming a version of the Russian memoir Dersu Uzala, a project idea he had abandoned years before because he wanted to film the story on actual locations in Siberia, something Japanese studios considered too expensive and too difficult to obtain needed permissions; MosFilm's offer to produce the film renewed Kurosawa's spirits and career' it should also be noted the name of famed Hollywood producer Roger Corman appears in the above trailer; he helped secure US distribution for the film...

Years later, George Lucas would hear Kurosawa was again having difficulties getting his films made; Lucas was riding on the crest of his first Star Wars picture, which was inspired by Kurosawa's film The Hidden Fortress; Lucas used his newfound pull in Hollywood and, along with another rising director, Francis Ford Coppola, found backing for new Kurosawa projects as a means of sort of repaying the artistic debt they felt they owed Kurosawa; other Hollywood directors and stars would also pitch in to back Kurosawa's later works, including Steven Spielberg who partially financed Kurosawa's last films...

Although mainly known for his Samurai films like The Seven Samurai, Ran, Sanjuro, and Yojimbo, Kurosawa had a flair for capturing the smaller scale 'epics' of modest human interaction like Dersu Uzala; one of his greatest such films is Ikiru (To Live), the story of an aging low level bureaucrat who has faithfully worked at his job for over thirty years and receives a diagnosis of about a year left to live; virtually ignored by his family and a cypher to his coworkers, he sets out, alone, to try to make sense of the purpose of life; the film really captures the torment and realization of the main character; I first saw this film in the early 70s on PBS; a film well worth seeing...











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[tmccarthy]

vienna: Interesting

[tmccarthy]

[Jimbuna]

[Rhodes]

Originally Posted by vienna;2683004
Although mainly known for his Samurai films like [I

The Seven Samurai[/I], Ran, Sanjuro, and Yojimbo, Kurosawa had a flair for capturing the smaller scale 'epics' of modest human interaction like Dersu Uzala; one of his greatest such films is Ikiru (To Live), the story of an aging low level bureaucrat who has faithfully worked at his job for over thirty years and receives a diagnosis of about a year left to live; virtually ignored by his family and a cypher to his coworkers, he sets out, alone, to try to make sense of the purpose of life; the film really captures the torment and realization of the main character; I first saw this film in the early 70s on PBS; a film well worth seeing...

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Indeed. Two years ago I decided to see several Japanese films, re-seeing a few and seeing others for the first time. Ikiru was one of those I saw for the first time. Incredible film, the bureaucracy of japan the struggle of the main character.

Saw several of the samurai: Hara-kiri, Sword of Doom and others.

High and Low was a surprise, great film by Kurosawa. I liked to see the actors that always portrayed samurais in a contemporary film.

[vienna]

I got lucky when I moved to LA in 1970; there were four or five Japanese film theaters here, most of them controlled by the major Japanese film studios (Toei, Toho, etc.) and they showed a wide mix of films, form the very latest to revivals of older releases; one theater, the Linda Lea, had triple bills all the time, changing weekly, with an old samurai film (known as chambara) as the opening film, followed by a Yakuza film, followed by a modern exploitation film, usually of a titillating nature; the other theaters shied away from the more 'risque' releases and showed either classics or films currently popular in Japan. I spent many, many hours watching some of the very best and some of the worst of Japanese cinema; now, due to home video and streaming, the theaters are long gone and the chances to see, on a big screen, some of those are few and far between...


Re High and Low: the film is a sort of reversal for Kurosawa who had many of his films remade by US filmmakers; Kurosawa based his film on US author Ed McBain's novel King's Ransom...


One of the most spectacular Japanese films ever made was 1965's Kwaidan, a collection of four traditional ghost stories masterfully brought to life and filmed by director Masaki Kobayashi; its sort of a Twilight Zone anthology that is at the same time very creepy and astonishingly beautiful and well worth seeking out on video:








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[tmccarthy]

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