MovieChat Forums > Kagemusha (1980) Discussion > Advise from Kurosawa's enthusiasts pleas...

Advise from Kurosawa's enthusiasts please

posted 15 years ago by jean_dave77
15 replies | jump to latest

Hello everyone, for a long time now, I’ve been very interested in watching Kurosawa’s films. However for any given number of reasons, I’ve waited until now to finally do it. As you can imagine, the expectations have been raising very high, due to the positive criticism most of Kurosawa’s films receive. I wanted to start with “Ran”, but I could not find it in any video rental stores in my city. So I chose “Kagemusha”. My first impression of the film was good because of the beautiful cinematography, and minimalist style of the camerawork, but later on I started to get really confused and bored with the story. I think a lot of it had to do with the language, I felt that much was getting lost in the translation/subtitles. Another thing is that I really don’t know much about Japanese history. Would you say that it was a mistake trying to start Kurosawa with “Kagemusha”? Would you recommend any other of his films to start familiarizing with this director? I will appreciate very much your comments on this.

[–] kroby 15 years ago

Kurosawa is my favourite director.
I watched Seven samurai in 1998(I was 19). I was in complete awe and was drawn into the world of cinema. Thats the reason why I am a film buff now.

I watched kurosawa in the following order...no particular reason, it just happened like that.

Seven Samurai
Kagemusha(left the screening as I was heavily bored, I want to watch it again)
Rhaspsody in August
Ran
Rashomon
Yojimbo
Sanjuro
Red Beard
Dreams
Ikiru
High and Low
Derzu uzala

I think it would be better if you watch them chronologically.
I would say, start with seven samurai.

[–] 15 years ago

[deleted]

[–] TravisLikesSmoothJazz 8 years ago

Kagemusha features one of the best Tatsuya Nakadai performances, I might even like it better than Ran. It is an underrated movie, a masterpiece.

I am an *beep* but my friends compensate for that.

[–] j_money77 14 years ago

Kagemusha is definitely not the place i'd recommend people to begin examining the work of Kurosawa. You were right in suspecting that at least some knowledge of the period and principles in this time in Japanese history are important to understand the necessity of everything shown on screen. A little history of the production and the timeframe in Kurosawa's life in which it was made helps a little bit too.

The movie ran into a few problems in pre production and continued up to the beginning of teh shoot---where Kurosawa replaced the star on the first day of filming, and basically had to adapt his screenplay to fit the new star of the movie.

Also, Kagemusha contains some of the worst, and I do mean WORST music in any kurosawa movie. Apparently he recruited a person to do the score that he had no previously worked with and it ends up being entirely too hammy and hollywood sounding.

A great place for a new Kurosawa fan to start is the movie that introduced him to the world Rashomon----also The Seven Samurai is something most people know about or see reagardless of interest in Kurosawa or not. Ran is very indiciative of his work and, I think, one of his greatest accomplishments. Any of those would be a great place to start, but whatever you do, don't neglect to watch Ikiru, which isn't a typical Kurosawa movie but maybe the most moving.

[–] jean_dave77 14 years ago

Thank you very much for your advice. I'll try to get Rashomon and give it a try. Do you know of any new Japanese films that are worth watching?

[–] j_money77 14 years ago

Sorry i'm not that knowledgeable in Japanese cinema myself. I just recently got into the works of Kurosawa when I saw Ran based on a recommendation from a friend of mine.

[–] ronniekirkwood 14 years ago

You should check out Takashi Miike movies. My personal favourite is Ichi The Killer.

[–] cltravag 14 years ago

if you want to go from kurosawa to miike i would start with gozu.

for normal, modern japanese films, departures is excellent, as is tokyo sonata. they're both rather hammy, unfortunately.
also, a wonderful but overlooked classical director is masaki kobayashi, in which i would definitely start with hara kiri/seppuku (same movie).

Attica! Attica!

[–] cltravag 14 years ago

[–] turkeyonthehill 14 years ago

I just wanted to add the to excellent advice offered so far by others to say that there's another Kurosawa movie I think is one of his best but is less well known:

Stray Dog.

It's not a samurai film, but nor is Ikiru and personally I think they are two of his finest, along with Ran, Throne of Blood, Rashomon and, of course, Seven Samurai.

I agree that Kagemusha is not the best place to start!

[–] kroby 11 years ago

I had commented in this thread in 2009.
Now I've completed watching all Kurosawa films and I think any of his samurai films Seven Samurai/Yojimbo/Sanjuro/Hidden Fortress/Rashomon would be good starting point.

[–] joet1999 11 years ago

If you are interested in overall Japanese cinema check out these guy's work:
Akira Kurosawa (obviously there are his most famous works, like Seven Samurai, but his lesser known greats include: Red Beard, Dodes'Ka-Den, Dersu Uzala, High and Low and The Lower Depths)
Kenji Mizougchi (maybe the greatest, Sansho the Bailiff, Ugetsu, Life of Oharu, 47 Ronin, The Story of the Late Chrysanthemums, lots of others)
Sadao Yamanka (Tsao Tzen and the Pot Worth 1 million Ryo, Priest of Darkness and Human and Paper Balloons, they are his three surviving films, all great)
Kanteo Shindo (The Naked Island, Kuroneko, Onibaba, Children of Hiroshima)
Hideo Gosha (The Secret of the Urn, Sword of the Beast, Goyokin, Three Outlaw Samurai, Samurai Wolf)
Hiroshi Inagaki (Samurai Trilogy)
Masaki Kobayashi (The Human Condition, Kwaidan, Samurai Rebellion, Harakiri)
Shohei Imamura (Ballad of Narayama, The Pornographers, The Eel)
Tomu Uchida (Fugitive From the Past, A Bloody Spear at Mount Fuji, Miyamoto Musashi series, The Master Spearman, Yoshiwara: The Pleasure Quarter)
Yasujiro Ozu (All of them, Tokyo Twilight, Toky Story, Woman of Tkyo, Late Autumn, Floating Weeds, Late Autumn)
Mikio Naruse (When a Woman Ascends the Stairs, Floating Clouds, Late Chrysanthemums, there are many others)
Eiichi Kudo (13 Assassins, The Great Killing, Eleven Samurai)
Kon Ichikawa (Fires on the Plain, Ten Dark Women, The Burmese Harp, The Men of Tohoku)

Those are probably the best you can go for, I recommend watching their films if you take an interest in Japanese culture and also you may enjoy reading the plays of Chikamatsu and some Noh, Kabuki and Bunraku plays! I hope this post was informative for a few people who may have been interested.

'Loneliness has followed me my whole life' - Travis Bickle Taxi Driver

[–] babyfett 10 years ago

My start was:

The hidden fortress - if you like the original star wars, go here.

Rashomon - because I read it was his international break-through

Seven Samurai - being a widely heralded as a masterpiece of world cinema history.

Yojimbo - inspiration for the 'The man with no name' films, starring Clint Eastwood.

And so on ..

Karate Kat Street Frogs Mini-Monsters Tigersharks DVD: ipetitions.com/petition/comicstripondvd?e

[–] tobias_681 10 years ago

I haven't watched so many of his movies (5). I've started with Rashomon and that was fine. It's my favorite of his. I recomend you to start with Rashomon too. The story is really interresting, the cinematography is wonderfull and it's not that long. There's a guarantee you won't get bored.

---

You see things; and you say Why? But I dream things that never were and I say Why not?

[–] EpsilonX 9 years ago

The hidden fortress is probably a decent place to start. It's more fun and adventurous than anything else, so it's easy to get into. Seven samurai as well