When did Akira Kurosawa write Rashomon?

It rained cats and dogs, and the dilapidated city gate was crumbling. Three people hid under the tree to avoid the rain. Isn't this the Christian prophecy about the end of the world? But Rashomon has nothing to do with Christian mythology. The story it tells took place in heian period (794- 1 184). The broken gate-Rashomon was the gate of Kyoto, the capital of Japan at that time. Rashomon is the first Japanese film to attract international attention, and its first act has obvious characteristics of Kurosawa-it is easy to connect Christianity with Zen in one picture, which I am afraid only Kurosawa can do. Introducing the myth of one culture to the audience of another culture through the film language, and at the same time showing the mutual influence between different cultures, is the idea that runs through Akira Kurosawa's career as a director, and thus has made several excellent films in the film history.

The story of Rashomon revolves around a murder case. From the conversation of three men sheltering from the rain under Rashomon Gate, we know that a robber was sexually lured, attacked a couple, tied up her husband and raped his wife in front of him. Soon people found her husband's body. Who is the murderer? Then three parties-the robber, the wife and the dead husband (through the mouth of the witch) and the witnessed woodcutter told the story respectively. Four people have four different versions of the same thing. Who is telling the truth? Finally, we realized that all four people were lying. Why?

Mifune Junlang plays a robber in Rashomon, and he plays a major role in several films of Kurosawa.

Mifune Junlang (as a robber), Jing Mazi (as a wife) and Masayuki Mori (as a husband) performed a story that happened more than 1000 years ago.

The story of Rashomon took place at three different times: the present tense of three men sheltering from the rain under Rashomon, the past tense of court trial and the past tense of murder. Kurosawa used his unique film language to express different times. Now the story takes place under Rashomon, which is like a stage for an actor to perform, just like an indoor drama. The scene of the trial was completed with a fixed lens, and the lens was always pointed at the talking witness. This angle is the judge's perspective, but the judge never appeared. He didn't say a word, just listened to the witness talk endlessly. When shooting a murder case, by moving the lens quickly, the picture is full of tension and excitement, which not only reproduces the subjective description of the parties, but also records objectively from a distance. At the same time, Kurosawa also used different light and shadow effects to express different times: Rashomon was shrouded in dark clouds; The court is in full view; The murder scene was sunny. Time is constantly changing in the film, but without any explanation, the audience can immediately know whether it is now or in the past.

Mifune Junlang (playing the robber) and Masayuki Mori (playing the husband) are both in the play-one case, four versions.

Memories of four people begin one after another, and their difference lies in the description of what they have done. The robber said he was fighting for love. In order to get the woman he raped, he had a duel with her husband. After a fair and difficult battle, he finally won. The woman who was raped said that after being raped by robbers, she asked her husband to kill her, but he looked at her very coldly and contemptuously. Feeling ashamed and angry, she stabbed her husband to death with her precious dagger. The dead husband expressed his pain through the mouth of the witch. He said it was a great shame for him to walk with the robber after his wife was raped. In order to protect his reputation and dignity, he committed suicide with his wife's dagger. The woodcutter said that he saw what happened with his own eyes. The fact is that the robber raped that woman. At first, he really wanted to have her, but when he found out that this woman's husband had abandoned her, he also decided to abandon her. The woman was ashamed and angry and said, "Who is the strong one?" So the two started a duel. In fact, both of them are afraid of being killed in the fight. Finally, the robber killed the woman's husband with his own sword. And the valuable dagger mentioned by the husband and wife, he said he didn't see it at all.

Mifune Junlang (as a robber) and Jing Mazi (as a wife) use rich body language and expressions to express the thoughts and feelings of the characters in the classic silent film Rashomon.

All four people lied at some point in order to deny the crime or just to beautify themselves. In short, "everyone is saying what is good for him." When the parties lie, the music is very strong, as if to say angrily: They are lying! So the music of this movie is not pure music, it tells the story of Rashomon completely independently. The film also uses the dislocation of sound and picture to create tension or expose lies and illogical statements. The actors in this film, especially Mifune Junlang (playing the robber) and Inomachiko (playing the raped woman), use rich but not exaggerated body language and expressions to express the feelings and thoughts of the characters. Therefore, Rashomon is a silent film, but it is full of emotion and shocking. Akira Kurosawa is an excellent director. He seamlessly combined the Japanese stories that took place in the 1 1 century, the natural metaphors of Scandinavian silent films, the subtleties of photography and editing in various periods in film history, and the music used as explanations ... So Rashomon, a world-famous classic, came into being. In Japan, "Rashomon" was openly rejected, but internationally, it won praise and film festival awards.

Rashomon reflects a weakness of human nature, that is, it cannot be honest with itself. Even the dead have to defend themselves, just to lie for the so-called honor. 198 1 published Akira Kurosawa's autobiography, which was written in 195 1, was the year when Rashomon won the Golden Lion Award at the Venice Film Festival. Kurosawa said in his autobiography, "As a director, Rashomon opened the door to international movies for me; As an autobiographer, I can't walk through this door solemnly and slowly to continue writing my life ... If you want to know what Akira Kurosawa looks like after Rashomon, you'd better go and see the movies he made after Rashomon and get to know the characters inside. Because although it is difficult for a person to be 100% honest with himself, it is difficult for him to avoid the facts if he appears as someone else. "

Masayuki Mori and Keiko Keima play husband and wife in the movie Rashomon, which is the first Japanese film to win an international award.

● Photos taken by Mifune Junlang (as a robber) and Masayuki Mori (as a husband) during the audition.

Deep in the jungle

Akutagawa Ryunosuke's novel ("Rashomon" is adapted from this novel) is directed at people's hearts, and it is very thorough, just like dissecting people's hearts with a surgeon's scalpel, revealing the hidden desires and pursuits in people's hearts. I use carefully set light and shadow scenes to explain this amazing desire and pursuit. The people in the film are lost in the deep bushes, getting farther and farther, and falling into a wilderness.

Akira Kurosawa

Akira Kurosawa

abstract

Three people took shelter from the rain under Rashomon Gate. They are talking about a murder that just happened. A robber attacked a young couple. He tied her husband to a tree and raped his wife in front of him. Soon people found her husband's body. The robber was arrested. The four sides-the robber, the husband, the wife and the witness woodcutter-told the story from their own angles, but they had different opinions. The authenticity of facts is no longer important, and the subjectivity of facts has become the focus of attention.

be in charge of/supervisor

Kurosawa, 19 10 was born in Tokyo on March 23rd. After graduating from junior high school, I studied painting and then worked in film and literature. At the age of 26, he worked as an assistant director in PCL Film Company, the predecessor of Dongbao Film Company. Soon after, Dongbao Film Company took over. As an assistant to the famous director Kajir? Yamamoto, he began to study director and screenwriter. 1943, Akira Kurosawa completed his first novel, Pose Sanshiro, which was a great success and was regarded as a new hope for Japanese films. From 65438 to 0950, Rashomon directed by Kurosawa won the Golden Lion Award at the Venice Film Festival that year, which was the first time that a Japanese film won an international award. Akira Kurosawa became the most important director in the Japanese film industry after shooting Live (1952) and Seven Samurai (1953), and he successfully presented the myth of Japanese culture to those westernized audiences. In addition, he also put the works of Dostoevsky and Shakespeare on the screen, and these films received special attention from the West. From 65438 to 0957, Akira Kurosawa directed The Spider's Web Palace Castle, an adaptation of Macbeth, which finally made Japanese actor toshiro mifune an international superstar. Later, he cooperated many times and became the strongest film partner in Japan. Mifune Junlang also appeared in Kurosawa's samurai comedies "The Escort" (1960) and "Ten Blacks" (1962). 1963, Kurosawa and Junlang of Mifune co-produced Heaven and Hell, which is Kurosawa's only gangster film. From 65438 to 0975, Kurosawa directed the Japanese-Russian joint venture film Desu Uzara, which won the gold medal at the Moscow Film Festival and the Oscar for best foreign language film. 1980, with the support of a French company, Akira Kurosawa and Junlang of Mifune co-produced Shadow Warrior again and won the Palme d 'Or Award at Cannes Film Festival. In his later years, Kurosawa became more persistent in his pursuit of art and his works were more philosophical. 1993, Akira Kurosawa directed his pioneering work Curling Sunset. In the film, an old teacher meets his students every year. Whenever someone asks him if he is ready to die, he always says "madadayo", which means "not yet" and "maybe". 1September 6, 998, Akira Kurosawa died in Tokyo.

● Director Akira Kurosawa, who organically and harmoniously links eastern and western cultures-Zen and Christianity, Shakespeare and Japanese classical literature.

thin-film material

Country: Japan

Year: 1950

Director: Akira Kurosawa

Screenwriter: Shinobu Hashimoto Kurosawa, adapted from Akutagawa Ryunosuke's short story.

Photography: Kazuo Kurosawa

Editing: Akira Kurosawa

Composer: Fumio Hayasaka

The main actors: Mifune Junlang (as a robber), Jing Mazi (as a wife), Masayuki Mori (as a husband), Takashi Shimura (as a woodcutter) and minoru chiaki (as a monk).

Awards: 195 1 Venice International Film Festival Golden Lion Award; 195 1 Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film

comment

Rashomon is one of the few classic movies that are truly not limited by the times.

Creativity: ☆☆☆☆☆

Innovation: ☆☆☆

Cast: ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

Music: ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

Classic index: ☆.