MovieChat Forums > Ugetsu monogatari (1954) Discussion > Did John Milius rip this film off?

Did John Milius rip this film off?

posted 18 years ago by funkyfry
12 replies | jump to latest

I just saw the film for the first time last week, and it seemed to me that several scenes were imitated by John Milius when he made his movie "Conan the Barbarian" in the late 70s. I don't know if anyone else has ever noticed these before because I might be the only person who's seen "Conan" enough times and also seen "Ugetsu". Anyway, there is a scene in "Conan" with the actor Mako killing someone with his spear and it is very similar to the same type of scene in "Ugetsu", right down to the same line of dialog (barring translation confusion) "I killed him with my spear" (said in a tone of amazed satisfaction in both films).

Then in the same part of "Conan" there is a scene where Mako paints runic symbols all over Conan's body to ward off the evil spirits who have come to claim his soul. This was obviously very similar to the scene near the end of "Ugetsu" though it was handled totally differently. I know the "film geek" generation in the 70s liked their Japanese classics and it would actually surprise me if these similarities were coincidental or if there weren't possibly even more similarities that I didn't notice because it was only the first time I've seen "Ugetsu".

Comments?

Did I not love him, Cooch? MY OWN FLESH I DIDN'T LOVE BETTER!!! But he had to say 'Nooooooooo'

[–] 18 years ago

[deleted]

[–] funkyfry 18 years ago

Yeah, I figured he might have seen it while he was in film school, which also probably means that George Lucas saw it since I believe they were in the same class, and John Carpenter as well (?). It would be interesting if there were influences in their other films as well. Lucas is known as a Kurosawa man, I wonder if he would find "Ugetsu" too ambiguous for his tastes.

Did I not love him, Cooch? MY OWN FLESH I DIDN'T LOVE BETTER!!! But he had to say 'Nooooooooo'

[–] 18 years ago

[deleted]

[–] funkyfry 18 years ago

I've seen all of Lucas' movies but I've only seen "Ugetsu" among Mizoguchi's films, so I could only compare them to this film. Though I do plan on seeing more of Mizoguchi's films.

Did I not love him, Cooch? MY OWN FLESH I DIDN'T LOVE BETTER!!! But he had to say 'Nooooooooo'

[–] Scarletfire-1 18 years ago

You need to see Sansho the Bailiff. Look on the message board for that one for info on how to get a DVD with English language subs.

[–] funkyfry 18 years ago

Thanks, I'll keep an eye out for it. I couldn't find it on netflix unfortunately.

Did I not love him, Cooch? MY OWN FLESH I DIDN'T LOVE BETTER!!! But he had to say 'Nooooooooo'

[–] SouthernDrawl 18 years ago

I suggest that you get as many people as possible to request Netflix to add the films to their collections.

Nemo me impune lacessit

[–] Ohiowatha 17 years ago

While Milius readily admits that he "steals" (this is no insult as "good artists borrow, great artists steal") lots of his scenes from classics, I cannot say that either of these two scenes are the basis of those in Conan. I have seen the Barbarian many times, but they just don't seem that congruent. POSSIBLY the spear scene, but the runes, not so sure. It's just customary to paint such runes on the body to ward off spirits in some Eastern cultures. So perhaps Milius is just aware of that. Or maybe he lifted it from Ugetsu--hard to say, but interesting.

[–] STEVE-1559 15 years ago

The runes thing is probably taken from KWAIDAN, which had a similar scene. The scene of Conan with the "Wolf Witch" is very vaguely inspired by the "Yuki-Ona" sequence from the same film.

I cannot recall a specific quote in which Milius admitted this, but the assertion appears in the cover story that Cinefantastique magazine published on the film when it came out. The writer interviewed Milius for the article, so I think he was at least paraphrasing, not advancing an unsupported theory, but I cannot recall for sure.

[–] Poisoned_Dragon1964 15 years ago

The writing on the body is from the Tale of Hoichi the Earless, translated to English by Lafcadio Hearn:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H%C5%8Dichi_the_Earless

§« The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters. »§

[–] panemique 9 years ago

Masterfully adapted in movie-form in Kwaidan, by Masaki Kobayashi.

[–] mevmijaumau 9 years ago

As well as in Shuji Terayama's The Grass Labyrinth.