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
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