Kurosawa's Greatness Part 2: The Early 50s and 'Ikiru'

I should note that I still have yet to see 'The Idiot'. I've heard varied responses from critics on it as a film, but they all seem to concur that it stands out from his oeuvre in a unique fashion. 

Kurosawa's 1950's period started off with two films that could not be more different: the media and courtroom satire Scandal and the tense mystery period piece Rashomon. In terms of style, Kurosawa could not be more differentiated in his approaches to the two films.

Scandal, though not lacking in weighty moments, opens with a rather lighthearted tone where the friendship between artist Ichiro Aoye (Toshirō Mifune), and singer, Miyako Saijo (Shirley Yamaguchi) is ludicrously spun into an illicit affair by the press, and the weak-willed incompetence of their lawyer Hiruta (Takashi Shimura) is played for laughs. It soon becomes a far more affecting film, however, with Hiruta's moral dilemma between his clients and a hefty bribe, and though I don't think the film ever coheres these two sides together perfectly, it makes for two solid halves of a film, and overall a decent film.

Rashomon is often touted as Kurosawa's greatest film. It's testament to his talent that I don't quite agree with that statement, and would not put it in my top 5 of his films, yet I still do consider it to be a terrific film overall. It takes the now iconic storytelling technique of telling the same incident - the murder of a samurai (the underrated Masayuki Mori), and the rape of his wife (Machiko Kyō), by a nefarious bandit (Mifune) - through multiple perspectives, and playing with the audience's perceptions. The one thing that keeps me from embracing this as one of Kurosawa's best films is its clinical nature, which is of course a very subjective opinion. There's emotional power to be had in the margins of the woodcutter witness' (Shimura) arc, and some dark humour to be found in the lies and hypocrisies of the various characters, but overall I don't think it has quite the impact of Kurosawa's best works. It certainly is a meticulously scripted feature with astounding cinematography, and uniformly terrific performances, so even though I don't love it, I admire it a great deal. Definitely worth a watch.

Kurosawa's most famous, and most influential film, was Seven Samurai. The film directly influenced one of the most famous Westerns of all-time, The Magnificent Seven (and its surprisingly decent remake), and also set the precedent for the 'man on a mission' style of film. There'd been films of that sort done before this - from Hollywood's Sahara to all manner of British WWII films - but never in quite this fashion. The way we are introduced to the ensemble of heroes undergoing an ardous mission to save a poverty-striken village from nasty bandits, in a methodical, precise, informative and perfectly organic fashion, is something that's continued to be emulated in everything from The Dirty Dozen to Rogue One. The way each character leaves his mark on the film is an incredible achievement, and makes the already fantastic action sequences all the more powerful through Kurosawa's deftly drawn characterizations of these samurai risking their lives. It's one of Kurosawa's very best films, with a simple and straightforward story of good v.s. evil, that gradually becomes a rather compelling study of the cost of heroism. Plus the theme song ranks among the greatest scores of all-time.

Kurosawa's greatest film in this period though was, in my opinion, the underseen, underrated and incredible Ikiru. I'll admit I'm always a mark for Scrooge-esque stories of a miserable old man inspired towards the greater good, but Ikiru is no simple reworking of A Christmas Carol. Rather, it takes that inspiring tale and morphs it into a far more cynical, heartbreaking, and tragic tale which nevertheless ends up being one of the most stirring tributes to the human spirit in cinematic history. Mr Watanabe, played with incredible restraint by Takashi Shimura, is a lifeless office drone who becomes diagnosed with terminal cancer. I could draw comparisons all day with Shimura's Watanabe and say, Bryan Cranston's Walter White in Breaking Bad as both works so eloquently convey the shattering, devastating impact such news brings to the lives of these men, whom life has not looked too kindly upon. But where Walt chose to go down a dark route to provide for his family (supposedly), Watanabe ends up on a very different journey of self-discovery, trying to plumb the darkness of his soul for some light of hope, some way to provide to the happiness of the world, a happiness he so sorely lacks.

It's hard to describe in words what Kurosawa does with this film that's so impactful. Few have conveyed both utter hopelessness, and immense joy through a character's broken singing. Kurosawa's screenplay shows us the life of a man that is at times uncomfortable to watch due to his timidity, and reveals a growing resolve within him to do something with his life that is so compelling. It's Kurosawa's most emotional film, and contains some of the finest work he did in his career. And in Shimura he coaxed out a performance of sublime power, one which springs out on you so unexpectedly.