Kurosawa Series: Part Seven

THE BAD SLEEP WELL (1960)

Bouncing off Throne of Blood’s Shakespearean bedrock, I decided to take a look at Kurosawa’s underappreciated The Bad Sleep Well; a film grounded in motifs akin to “Hamlet”, but told in a contemporary setting. As we all know, “Hamlet” entails themes of vengeance and corruption, and as it turned out – perhaps fatefully – corporate corruption was a fixture in newspaper headlines during the time this film was made, so Kurosawa found himself facing adversity and naysayers aplenty prior to the picture’s release. Not only that, the director’s biting commentary on Japanese bureaucracy underwent several rewrites from a total of five screenwriters, including Kurosawa himself.

Kurosawa apparently never trusted himself to pen any of his scripts alone; he typically solicited support from secondary writers to ensure that his own writing wasn’t used as a tool to make his directing easier. However, incorporating such a large amount of writers was bound to generate some difficulty, and that it did, as we can tell from the film’s somewhat erratic structure. Although sloppy toward the end – and even a bit rushed – the film still manages to be as engrossing as possible and the acting is hands down the best I’ve seen in any Kurosawa film.

The film’s opening is pivotal and really sets the vengeful tone that permeates throughout. It’s a wedding scene, but far from celebratory. Being my eleventh Kurosawa film, The Bad Sleep Well allowed me to finally pick up on Kurosawa’s recurrent use of choruses: groups of minor characters that fill the audience in on what’s occurring. In Throne of Blood it was usually a group of gossiping soldiers. Here, it’s a group of gossiping reporters. As we later learn, this is purely a marriage of convenience; the bride and groom being the daughter (Kyoko Kagawa) of a development corporation’s Vice President (Masayuki Mori) and that company’s President’s secretary Nishi (Toshiro Mifune, in a deceptively placid role). One would assume the “convenience” here is merely financial, but it’s far more sinister than that.

The reception encounters several noteworthy interruptions. First, the arrival of a mysterious wedding cake baked to resemble the company’s headquarters; with a single rose jutting out one of the windows. Following this peculiar event, Wada (Kamatari Fujiwara), a corporation employee, is arrested under suspicion of partaking in a bribery scheme and, following his inquiry, attempts suicide by jumping into an active volcano. Wada’s more or less “saved” by Nishi (who’s unveiled as a ruthless man bent on avenging his father’s death) but learns that the calculating secretary plans to use him as an accessory to destroy the corporation from the inside.

Not unlike The Most Beautiful, Kurosawa’s portrayal of Japan’s value system in The Bad Sleep Well would probably seem alien to most westerners. The notion of lower level employees vowing silence and even sacrificing themselves in order to veil their superiors’ unlawful activities sounds absurd to most of us, but in post-war Japan – and perhaps even today – many underling employees like Wada felt a constrained sense of loyalty towards their bosses – for reasons purely pertaining to principle – thus placed their lives on the line to protect them.

The most fascinating juxtaposition I’ve seen in a Kurosawa film so far is between Wada and Nishi. Both are victims of the corporation’s crimes in one way or the other, but only Nishi intends to exact revenge. Wada, even after discovering that his superiors essentially threw him under the bus, still adheres to that deluded sense of loyalty and remains reluctant about assisting Nishi. The most blatant difference between these two men is hatred. Mifune’s subservient demeanor is only a facade used to dupe his boss/father-in-law; the actor’s trademark ire – which Wada lacks – is revealed away from the corporation. He’s accepted the fact that the only way to conquer evil is to become evil. “It’s not easy hating evil,” Nishi confesses. “You have to stoke your own fury until you become evil yourself.”

Kurosawa’s taken several whacks at industrial demoralization (High and Low, Ikiru) but I found this to be his weakest blow. He sets the stage up brilliantly, but seems to have trouble structuring his acts. The concept of driving the corrupt insane paces the film nicely up to a point, but the film hits a dry area towards the end and starts to move unnecessarily slow; only to culminate with a cop-out ending. This filler space, however, is transcended by Mifune’s and Fujiwara’s captivating performances. Kurosawa, like Bergman, knows how to develop and examine his characters, so if the plot ever becomes drab in spots, you can always fall back on the man’s compelling characterizations.

Overall, the film’s tone is dark, bleak and coolly crosses lines most films of this period wouldn’t even consider touching. The inventive camera techniques and noir-esque cinematography – which accentuate the characters' grim qualities – are also worth praising. Often melodramatic, yet boldly expressive, The Bad Sleep Well depicts man at his most cynical.

8.5/10

NOTE: I have finals coming up, so I’ll have to postpone the series – and reviews in general – until the semester ends. I’ll pick it back up around December 6th or so.

Kurosawa Series: Part Six

THRONE OF BLOOD (1957)

There have been countless stage and film adaptations of William Shakespeare’s “Macbeth”, but many film critics hold Kurosawa’s Throne of Blood to be one of the most successful renditions of the classic tragedy. The film was developed during what some consider to be an experimental stage in Kurosawa’s career. Rather than executing a by-the-numbers adaptation of the Shakespearean play, Kurosawa essentially transposes the story of Macbeth to his own ends. While the parallels are obvious, much of the original play has been modified to correspond with feudal Japan. Even the Macbeth character – here referred to as Washizu (Toshiro Mifune) – has been altered to appear somewhat less vindictive; only corrupted after adhering to his lady’s artful persuasion. The entire film represents a sort of moral document on dehumanization really, and while having only seen ten of Kurosawa’s films, I think it’s safe to say that this is his most nihilistic.

Anyone who’s taken a high school literature course should be familiar with “Macbeth”, so I won’t bore you with details on the original. Blood, on the other hand, offers more in terms of cultural relevance – as far as medieval Japan goes – and the ominous elements that Kurosawa so masterfully applies here are worth discussing. More structured and direct than the source material, Blood is told in four temporal blocks, making “Macbeth” feel a little more prolonged – yet a few sequences in Kurosawa’s version still seemed unnecessarily dragged out, but I digress.

Washizu – Macbeth’s equivalent – and Miki (Minoru Chiaki) – Banquo’s equivalent – are two commanders who encounter an enigmatic spirit in a forest maze. The spirit prophesizes that Washizu will rule over a northern garrison, while Miki will command the main fortress. The spirit also foretells that, in time, Washizu will be promoted to Lord of the Forest Castle and Miki’s son will eventually inherit the castle’s throne. Once the first half of the prophecy is realized, Washizu’s ruthless wife Asaji (Isuzu Yamada) advises her husband to speed up the rest of the prophecy by assassinating the current lord of Forest Castle and succeed the throne immediately. Influenced by Lady Asaji’s ambitious proposals, Washizu carries out a covert killing spree to ensure his reign over the Forest Castle.

Free will versus fate was typically what fueled our “Macbeth” discussions in high school, and here Kurosawa seems to imply that free will is purely idealistic and everything and everyone basically correlates with fate. Blood is first and foremost a portrait of Washizu’s indecisiveness, demonstrating how the future lord is ultimately pinned into a corner after Asaji fills his head with apprehension. If you really observe this film, you’ll begin to notice how integral the role of fog is to the plot; mostly as a symbolic implication of Washizu’s confused frame of mind, but also as a reference to the sometimes empty, heartless abyss of man’s soul. Blood also takes several steps further than “Macbeth” as a social critique of feudalism in Japan. As we’re all aware, Kurosawa has never been one to shy away from political agendas and he sums up the terror-filled customs of the feudal era quite clearly in this film.

One would expect an interpretation of “Macbeth” to feature its fair share of theatrics, but the stylization and handling of Blood felt more Spartacus than Olivier-esque. The scope is by far the widest of any “Macbeth” adaptation I’ve seen, yet in many ways just as claustrophobic as a stage version would be. Without completely omitting that dramatic Shakespearean allure, Kurosawa incorporates plenty of classical Noh techniques, largely evident in Mifune’s and Yamada’s – Asaji – facial expressions, which resembled Noh masks in certain scenes.

Certainly not my favorite Kurosawa film – although it's perhaps his most influential – Blood manages to do “Macbeth” justice without following any conventional pattern. It’s essential Kurosawa, and while I wasn’t able to fully invest in the film’s often hammy atmosphere, I couldn’t discount the almost perfectionist approach taken in every frame of this film.

8/10

Kurosawa Series: Part Five

IKIRU (1952)

WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD

Never before have I experienced a film that so beautifully encapsulates the human condition. “To live,” – which is the literal translation of Kurosawa’s Ikiru – is a task given to us all at birth, but how does one approach such a task when life itself seems so meaningless? Kurosawa never thought of himself as an existentialist, or as a director who probed the boundaries of existence, but with Ikiru, he does just that by employing an unfulfilled protagonist – who's on the brink of death – in order to emphasize humanity’s search for affirmation. I usually find films that hone in on old age and death to be unbearably somber, but when handled in a manner similar to Bergman’s Wild Strawberries, Ozu’s Tokyo Story and especially this film, I feel engulfed by a wave of optimism. The elderly protagonists portrayed in these films have attained peace of mind upon death, which gives the rest of us not something to look forward to, but one less thing to dread in life.

A narrator opens Ikiru by detailing the uneventful life of Kanji Watanabe (Takashi Shimura), a dull bureaucrat working the monotonous job of chief over a Public Works department. The corporate machine has essentially ruined Watanabe and his wife’s death certainly hasn’t helped in cultivating any form of active lifestyle. He’s unable to confide in his son (Nobuo Kaneko), who along with his daughter-in-law (Kyoko Seki) are oblivious to his despair and only show interest in benefiting from his pension. Making matters worse, the middle-aged chief has just recently been diagnosed – by a peculiarly vague doctor – with stomach cancer and, although uninformed, assumes he only has several months left to live. Watanabe’s cancer serves as the plot’s fulcrum, as it's primarily what drives the aging official on his quest for purpose. Faced with death, Watanabe is awakened to the doldrums of his existence, and from that point forward he seeks to live his life through others.

Similar to High and Low, Kurosawa’s Ikiru is separated into two introspective segments. The first half of the film, of course, summarizes Watanabe’s routine lifestyle and his eventual cancer diagnosis. It also sheds light on Watanabe’s relationships with two young people. The first of these characters is an uninspired novelist (Yunosuke Ito) he meets at a bar. The second is a young subordinate of his named Toyo (Miki Odagiri); who plans to resign due to the tediousness of her position. The loneliness Watanabe was subjected to over the years is momentarily appeased by these characters’ animated ways of life. However, the various activities he partakes in prove inefficient in aiding his journey toward individual purpose. In his old age, the bureaucratic drone begins to realize that he has lived his life in vain – contributing little to society – and no amount of boisterous activity with youngsters would change that.

Near the beginning of Ikiru, we’re shown several working class women who arrive at Watanabe’s department to complain about a sewage pit in their neighborhood. The women – mothers, factory workers, etc. – are given the runaround by virtually every department known to local government; failing to appeal to the better nature of these supposed “social” workers. By this point, Watanabe has finally come to his senses and resolves to vindicate his death by helping others with the power he’s held for years, but never implemented. Determined to accomplish something significant in life, Watanabe sets out to amend the sewage problem by initiating a proposed plan to build a park above the pit. The park is a godsend for Watanabe, and despite enduring severe illness, he succeeds at procuring that desired bliss he had long been searching for. In perhaps the most iconic scene in any Kurosawa film, Watanabe is seen swinging in the newly built park, presumably freezing, but hauntingly content and awaiting his inevitable demise.

Opposed to the first half of the film – seeing Watanabe in action and how he lived – the second portion of Ikiru exposes the aftermath of Watanabe’s death during his wake. The inner fortitude of his soul, expressed by his ungrateful associates, is displayed through flashbacks, mostly recounting his efforts to ensure the park’s completion. The wake scenes add a bittersweet touch on the film’s final moments, because in acknowledging Watanabe’s ambitious goals, all of his former co-workers seem incapable of giving credit to the man who made the park's conception possible. Only through alcohol are they able to understand the behavioral change Watanabe underwent following his “death sentence” and each of them vows to follow his example. Alas, sobriety annuls their dedicated spirits the next day, but the fruits of Watanabe’s labor do not go unappreciated by those who admired his determination the most.

Ikiru is more than simply profound. It’s a meditation on life and death that swells with human qualities capable of affecting us all in distinctive ways. I believe that, above all else – even critical acclaim – Kurosawa wanted viewers to comprehend the notion of living, and how the only way to truly live is by affirming one's place in the world. Life in general may in fact be meaningless, but what this film so vividly represents is man’s position as an individual and how the “meaning of life” is merely subjective.

9/10

Shut the front door

THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT (2010)

Indie films that are so overtly indie don’t usually bode well with me. They’re exhausting. This is typically the case with flicks like Juno that brim with “clever” quips and quirks; an effort to remind viewers that the film they’re watching is completely alternative to most of today’s mainstream trash. When that effort is strained, the film as a whole, story included, feel contrived. Unnatural vibes abound, eye-rolling commences, and I – personally – become completely detached. Lisa Cholodenko’s The Kids Are All Right came across as that sort of film in a few areas. From the hip music nods, to the “subliminal” environmental messages, the film seemed to have an air of forced bohemian quality. Luckily, unlike many of the mumblecore movies I abhor, the overall approach of Cholodenko’s Kids felt unexpectedly natural. I’d say this is mostly due to the presence of Annette Bening and Julianne Moore, two brilliant actresses who were able to exempt the film from the curse of hipster cinema.

The film follows Jules (Julianne Moore) and Nic (Annette Bening), a lesbian couple hailing from California, and their two children Joni (Mia Wasikowska) and Laser (Josh Hutcherson). Both kids were conceived via artificial insemination and once the eldest – Joni – turns eighteen, Laser requests that she arrange to meet their biological father, Paul (Mark Ruffalo) – who represents the film’s archetypal nonconformist. This little rendezvous with Paul is set up without their parents’ consent and goes swimmingly for the most part. The moms eventually find out about Paul and decide to invite him over for dinner – which creates an awkward atmosphere – in order to learn more about him and determine exactly where he would fit in family-wise. The dinner essentially opens a door into the kids’ lives for Paul, and with apprehension, the moms begin to realize that the freethinking restaurateur is inadvertently tearing their family apart.

I’ve read a number of criticisms on Kids, many of which slam the title for having nothing to do with the film at all. My take is this: the title isn’t supposed to insinuate that the kids are focal points. It instead serves as a message to overprotective parents who consider every possible precaution while raising their children rather than taking the time to ask themselves if those precautions are even necessary; that perhaps the kids are fine without the extra safeguards. Bening’s Nic character is strict by nature, making her the standard matriarch who takes every preemptive measure to protect her family from potential harm, yet by the end of the film she falls victim to her own overbearing ways. Cholodenko probably didn’t intend to imply any of this with the title – she actually derived it from a song by The Who – so the connotation is really anyone’s guess, but there’s my interpretation.

Morals and parenting tips aside, the performances are really what propel this film. Moore is tragically precise in her portrayal of an aimless, but admirable woman whose eccentricities are both delightful and understated. Bening, who God knows is overdue for an Oscar, delivers her second most accomplished performance of the year – the first being the less-talked-about Mother and Child – proving that she’s fully capable of harmonizing those neurotic tics of hers with pure authenticity. Ruffalo, stealing every scene he’s in with disheveled charm, is eerily candid; his character’s quirks seem complex – sadly unexplored – yet genuine and professionally honed to perfection.

Not too mellow, and not too melodramatic, Kids is a swell blend of drama and realism. Cholodenko truly has her actors to thank for this compelling look inside a fairly unconventional family dynamic. The writing’s adequate – a classy, but personal examination of lesbianism and sexual impulses – but the cast fuels the material presented. The sincere, affectionate interplay between Moore and Bening is something so rarely seen in contemporary romances and that's primarily what makes Kids one of the year’s best offers.

8.5/10

Kurosawa Series: Part Four

THE MOST BEAUTIFUL (1944)

Another wartime piece, The Most Beautiful serves as Kurosawa’s most propagandized, and perhaps most patriotic film. Following his successful directorial debut – Sanshiro Sugata – Kurosawa was eager to touch on the subject matter of war, specifically the toils of female factory workers and their outstanding resolve. The film was developed and released in the midst of World War II; three years after the attack on Pearl Harbor and a year prior to the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, so you have to consider the demographic here. This was Kurosawa’s ode to the female working class; a film made for the Japanese by the Japanese. A pseudo-documentary of sorts, Beautiful incorporates social realism in order to evoke the emotions of those who could directly relate to the women onscreen. While not his best film, or his most accessible, Beautiful signifies Kurosawa’s commitment to both his audience and his country.

Generally plot-driven, the film focuses more on situational aspects rather than the characters themselves. Before the film really began to flesh out, it felt reminisce of those History Channel documentaries teachers would use to bore students during high school. Kurosawa refrains from delving too deeply into the context of war, so the film isn't overbearingly didactic, but it's still propaganda. The story itself follows several women working in an optics factory during the second World War who are subjected to injury and illness, yet persevere as a result of their diligence.

To American audiences, the work ethic displayed in Beautiful is utterly foreign; these women are practically droids slaving away over their work instruments without complaint. The hard-working Watanabe – played by Yoko Yaguchi, Kurosawa’s wife – even opts to remain at the factory instead of visiting her dying mother. The women, proving to be the antithesis of corporate sloths, eventually crack under pressure and find their work quota in a slump. Luckily, through the power of song – and volleyball matches that would put Top Gun to shame – the ladies manage to boost their morale and their dropping quota.

In terms of character development, Beautiful disappoints, and even rivals Sanjuro’s forgettable cast. I mentioned above how these women are portrayed as robots essentially, but the performances are equally mechanical. I’m guessing this was intentional; to show the group as a singular unit hell-bent on carrying out its task. Void of identities, save Watanabe, the clan of women represent a body, each worker functioning as a limb; one worker becomes ill, the entire body is affected. From that perspective, the film succeeds as an informative look into Japan's industrial structure during the war. Not only that, the motif of teamwork is powerfully executed – not to mention globally familiar. So whether or not Kurosawa had Americans in mind while making Beautiful is irrelevant. The themes are timeless and there’s still much to be taken from this enjoyable and well-made tribute.

7.5/10

Kurosawa Series: Part Three

THE IDIOT (1951)

Staying with the postwar theme, I decided to take a look at what Kurosawa considered his most-talked-about film, The Idiot. Adapted from the novel by Russian author Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Kurosawa’s Idiot was met with a fair amount of adversity upon its release. The original cut of the film ran at a lengthy 265 minutes, but after an unfavorable screening, the studio forced Kurosawa to make drastic edits, ultimately botching the director’s original creation.

Since this original cut has been declared lost, I’m unable to judge whether or not the version I saw accomplished what Kurosawa intended to convey. I will say that the film succeeds at capturing the existential depths of human emotion via the film’s unbalanced hero, masterfully portrayed by an inscrutable Masayuki Mori, and at turning out an array of pensive character studies. Idiot seemed to bear the same impression as Being There in the sense of counteracting society’s norms with the mindscape of a mentally-challenged man, and how our perception of the world is possibly inferior to those we consider unstable.

Idiot tells the prolonged, oblique tale of Kinji Kameda (Mori) a former war criminal who has just checked out of an asylum where he was branded an “idiot” on account of his epileptic seizures brought on by a past ordeal. Mentally fragile, the presumed ex-con is taken in by friends of his family and eventually forms a platonic relationship with two women. The women, who eventually fall in love with him, are Taeko Nasu (Setsuko Hara), a “spoiled kept woman”, and Ayako (Yoshiko Kuga), the stern daughter of a wealthy landowner. He also befriends a man named Akama – played by Toshiro Mifune in another volatile role – who throws a wrench into Kameda’s love triangle after professing his love for Taeko, but is rejected after she chooses Kameda instead. Kameda’s reticent temperament in the matter is gawked at by everyone involved until he suffers an epileptic relapse, courtesy of the jilted Akama.

The overt theme of Idiot is innocence, brilliantly illustrated by Hokkaido’s wintry, majestic setting and by the virtuous Kameda. This “criminal” is considered a lamb by both his lovers and his enemies, and his behavior and mannerisms are uniquely childlike. His moral wisdom seems to exceed that of his peers, so much in fact that Ayako’s mother often tries to discern ulterior motives behind his Christ-like conduct. The greatest irony of Idiot is translated through Kameda’s effect on those around him and how that effect calls their own sanity into question; this is especially true for the love-addled Akama.

While Idiot is far from a technical feat – the editing is sloppy thanks to extensive cuts – it stands alone as an epic contemplation of empathy and affection. Admittedly, the film is a tad overlong, and I even cringed a little at the thought of experiencing the unadulterated version, but it didn’t necessarily feel like a chore to sit through. The performances are outstanding, Mori's and Mifune’s specifically, and the story, while slow, is emotionally riveting. Kurosawa’s hassles with the film are unfortunate, but his craftsmanship is impervious, immune to studio interference, and undeniably the key ingredient that makes Idiot a superlative entry in his catalogue of achievements.

8.5/10