Latest / Houselights: A Film Director Podcast / Kagemusha (1980) - Akira Kurosawa | Houselights #275

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Kagemusha (1980) - Akira Kurosawa | Houselights #275 · Houselights: A Film Director Podcast

0:03
Speaker 1: Welcome to the ned Palty.
0:21
Speaker 2: Welcome to Houselights for the last room in the House
0:24
Speaker 2: of Kurrasawa. As we've been examining the films of Akira Kurosawa,
0:28
Speaker 2: legendary Japanese director. Here on house Lights, we are examining
0:33
Speaker 2: Kaga Musha, the acclaimed nineteen eighty film from Akira Kurasawa,
0:38
Speaker 2: to close out this series of Rooms in the House
0:41
Speaker 2: of Kurrasawa. I am one of your hosts, soon to
0:44
Speaker 2: be dead General John Mills, and joining me is my
0:49
Speaker 2: very much friendlier, more reasonable, and more loving double, Darren Moser. Darren,
0:54
Speaker 2: Welcome to the final house in the House of Kurrasawa.
0:57
Speaker 2: We are one person light this evening because you know what,
1:00
Speaker 2: I messed up that opening. I guess he should be
1:02
Speaker 2: the dead general and I'm the impostor, and then you're
1:05
Speaker 2: the very very.
1:06
Speaker 3: Easy in the jar.
1:07
Speaker 2: Yeah, Tristan is a Tristan jar. You're right there. We
1:09
Speaker 2: go scratch all that. Tristan's in the jar. I'm the
1:12
Speaker 2: impostor and Darren is the puppet master pulling my strings
1:15
Speaker 2: that you all can see, and we're just having a
1:18
Speaker 2: time about it. Of course, reach out to the nerd
1:20
Speaker 2: party dot com slash contact if you have any directors
1:23
Speaker 2: in mind that you would like us to talk about
1:25
Speaker 2: as we close out the House of Currosawa. Here, So
1:28
Speaker 2: let's jump right in, Darren, here we are. This is
1:30
Speaker 2: a movie both of us have not seen. This is
1:33
Speaker 2: a Courrosawa classic. This was a co winner for the
1:37
Speaker 2: Palm Door at the can Film Festival in nineteen eighty.
1:40
Speaker 2: So it's a beloved film. It has an eighty nine
1:43
Speaker 2: percent on Rotten Tomatoes. It's a very critically regarded film.
1:47
Speaker 2: It has a criterion collection release. But the core question
1:50
Speaker 2: every time we study one of these films is did
1:52
Speaker 2: you even know this film existed before we decided to
1:54
Speaker 2: do House of Kurosawa.
1:56
Speaker 3: Unfortunately, like many of the Kirasala movies we've covered, I
2:00
Speaker 3: I did not, and it obviously, just from looking at
2:03
Speaker 3: the poster, obviously a period piece set in the fifteen
2:07
Speaker 3: you know, fifteen seventies, those roar and seventies. Yes, from
2:11
Speaker 3: way back when.
2:12
Speaker 2: Yes, but it is at its.
2:14
Speaker 3: Core though it's the At first I was thought we
2:17
Speaker 3: were going the Prince and Popper route where someone steps
2:21
Speaker 3: in to fill the role, but this is much more
2:24
Speaker 3: of the I'm clutching at power manipulation. It's more of
2:27
Speaker 3: a Dave situation.
2:28
Speaker 2: Yes, I thought of the same thing the film Dave
2:32
Speaker 2: starring Kevin Kline, where he steps in as a he's
2:35
Speaker 2: a dead ringer for the president and he steps in
2:37
Speaker 2: when the president has I think it's a stroke or
2:38
Speaker 2: something like that.
2:39
Speaker 3: Yeah, and so medically incapacitated.
2:41
Speaker 2: Yeah, and so to keep the illusion up, he steps in.
2:45
Speaker 2: But then he winds up getting a little big for
2:47
Speaker 2: his breeches and it angers his power brokers in the
2:50
Speaker 2: background and everything like that. But one of them played
2:52
Speaker 2: by a deliciously evil frankly Angela. As I recall, so, okay,
2:56
Speaker 2: so nothing going in, nothing nothing.
2:59
Speaker 3: I was like, hey, color, here we go. I'm going
3:01
Speaker 3: to enjoy this. Well.
3:02
Speaker 2: The thing is, I'm surprised we had never heard of this,
3:04
Speaker 2: because through this whole thing, we've been talking about how
3:06
Speaker 2: curs I was such an influence on Western films, and
3:09
Speaker 2: on one filmmaker in particular who cites them all the time,
3:12
Speaker 2: George Lucas, And you know, Lucas and Copola actually stepped
3:16
Speaker 2: in to get this film across the line because Toho,
3:19
Speaker 2: it seems that a consistent thread with all of these films.
3:22
Speaker 2: I don't know if I would ever want to work
3:24
Speaker 2: with Toho Studios because they seem to have problems financing
3:27
Speaker 2: films to the final to the final frame. But Copla
3:30
Speaker 2: and Lucas famously step in to help their revered film
3:34
Speaker 2: hero get this across the line. And what I want
3:37
Speaker 2: to ask actually is sort of an unorthodox, unorthodox question.
3:40
Speaker 2: But with that in mind, do you see anything that
3:43
Speaker 2: indicates to you that Lucas or Copla were more active
3:48
Speaker 2: than just funding. Does this carry any air of like, oh,
3:51
Speaker 2: I could see maybe a little bit of the producer
3:54
Speaker 2: standing on the side, you know, talking with the director.
3:56
Speaker 3: I don't think so. It seems like they were really
3:59
Speaker 3: just funding, especially that end fight, which also was very
4:03
Speaker 3: much a I don't want to say, show, don't tell,
4:06
Speaker 3: but like you don't see a lot and then you
4:08
Speaker 3: just see the aftermath of the big end fight, but
4:12
Speaker 3: it still has a lot of people involved. So or
4:15
Speaker 3: maybe they just cycled through the same three divisions and
4:18
Speaker 3: change the color of their banners. Who's to know, But
4:23
Speaker 3: it's interesting. This is such a cool part of film
4:26
Speaker 3: history because imagine you're Lucas and you hit it big
4:30
Speaker 3: in the seventies. You know, you know, just a few
4:32
Speaker 3: years before this, you're now a household name, your movie
4:36
Speaker 3: is the biggest movie ever in seventy seven, and you
4:40
Speaker 3: find a way to connect with you know, your film
4:43
Speaker 3: mentor inspiration and help him with one of his movies
4:47
Speaker 3: being in that right place, right time. I look at
4:50
Speaker 3: it as like, okay, if I hit it big and
4:52
Speaker 3: then I'm trying to help, you know, George Lucas on
4:55
Speaker 3: his Of course, I'm not giving him notes, I'm just
4:58
Speaker 3: giving him money. So so that's I think how I
5:01
Speaker 3: answer that.
5:01
Speaker 2: But what's even more interesting to me is they're helping
5:03
Speaker 2: with the funding and they have some sort of hand
5:06
Speaker 2: in it and devoting some sort of mental space to it.
5:09
Speaker 2: Lucas is making the Empire strikes Back, and Coppola is
5:12
Speaker 2: just coming out of Apocalypse Now. So I mean, these
5:15
Speaker 2: are two guys that are just they're fully yeah, they're
5:17
Speaker 2: fully engaged in their projects, and it's wild to me.
5:21
Speaker 2: I Mean, if anything, I think that speaks to a
5:25
Speaker 2: more collaborative spirit among the filmmaking, the up and coming
5:30
Speaker 2: or the breakthrough filmmakers of the seventies, is that they
5:34
Speaker 2: seem to be very collaborative if they had so much
5:36
Speaker 2: as a dime or some time, they were going to
5:38
Speaker 2: help you out, whether it was with a rewrite or
5:41
Speaker 2: suggested edits and stuff like that. And it's like that
5:43
Speaker 2: collaborative spirit I think is probably why we got such
5:46
Speaker 2: a batch of interesting films. But for anybody else who
5:49
Speaker 2: hasn't seen this film, Kagamusha is the tale of a
5:52
Speaker 2: It's basically like a historical fiction about a great general
5:57
Speaker 2: who's one of the warlords in feudal Shinjen and they
6:02
Speaker 2: decide to bring on a new double who's a dead
6:04
Speaker 2: ringer for him and so that he can get a
6:08
Speaker 2: little more leeway. One thing leads to another, he actually dies,
6:12
Speaker 2: and the basically to hold on to power, he tells everybody,
6:15
Speaker 2: don't tell anybody about my death. For three years, his
6:18
Speaker 2: generals conspire, they agree to it, and they keep them
6:21
Speaker 2: in power, including one of the lords that's helping this
6:24
Speaker 2: happen is his son, who's not next in line for
6:29
Speaker 2: the warlord's throne, but his son is next in line.
6:32
Speaker 2: There's intrigue, there's concern about keeping up appearances, and along
6:37
Speaker 2: the way, the impostor starts to reshape the relationships that
6:42
Speaker 2: people had with Shinjen because they don't know that he's
6:46
Speaker 2: not the real deal. So you know, like we were
6:48
Speaker 2: alluding to earlier, it's all somebody pretending to be somebody
6:51
Speaker 2: else sort of thing. But my question for you is
6:54
Speaker 2: we watch two different cuts. You watch the three hour cut,
6:56
Speaker 2: which is the I think the official cut, the Japanese.
7:00
Speaker 3: Probably the Criterion one.
7:01
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I watched the two hour and forty minute
7:04
Speaker 2: ish one that's regarded as the US release, And I
7:08
Speaker 2: know that even at the two hour forty minute mark,
7:10
Speaker 2: I was like, this is a little long. I got
7:12
Speaker 2: to know from you, like that's something that you interest
7:15
Speaker 2: in and I have struggled with a little bit as
7:17
Speaker 2: basically these films come together, they got long run times.
7:20
Speaker 2: Did you have trouble getting into this? Did you manage
7:23
Speaker 2: to get into this? Was it was a narrative cohesive
7:26
Speaker 2: enough to justify the three hours? I mean, this is
7:28
Speaker 2: an award winning film. So where did you land with that?
7:31
Speaker 3: I was brought into the story. It was a very
7:33
Speaker 3: interesting story and I felt engaged. But this movie could
7:37
Speaker 3: have been half the length, like easy. It just every
7:41
Speaker 3: sequence was And again, this is a modern sensibility. I
7:45
Speaker 3: totally get that if if I had the choice of
7:49
Speaker 3: watching the edited for TV version that is really about runtime,
7:53
Speaker 3: I'd probably enjoyed because it's not that the movie's not there,
7:57
Speaker 3: and it's not that the movie doesn't come across. It
7:59
Speaker 3: just takes it's sweet time, Like every battle is a
8:03
Speaker 3: long battle, Every meeting is a long meeting. You know,
8:07
Speaker 3: we talked about when we were starting the House of Kirasawa,
8:10
Speaker 3: that kind of inclination of showing, Okay, if we're gonna
8:13
Speaker 3: go over here, we're gonna watch everybody go over here
8:16
Speaker 3: and travel and get there, and that is still, you know,
8:19
Speaker 3: part of the filmmaking motif. So but all that to say,
8:24
Speaker 3: this movie has an interesting story. Is an amazing dual performance.
8:29
Speaker 3: I completely keep forgetting as I'm watching that the same
8:33
Speaker 3: actor is playing both roles of the general and the imposter.
8:37
Speaker 3: Because for seventy nine technology, for nineteen eighty technology, I
8:42
Speaker 3: never once thought, oh, is this a split screen? Is
8:45
Speaker 3: this what? However? They did it? It was flawless, like
8:48
Speaker 3: I always thought it was the same I always thought
8:51
Speaker 3: it was two people, and then I started thinking about it,
8:53
Speaker 3: I'm like, wait, no, that would be the same person.
8:56
Speaker 3: So so all that to say, yeah, story wise, engaging.
9:01
Speaker 3: But I could have used no intermission, just cut it
9:05
Speaker 3: down for run.
9:06
Speaker 2: But see, that's sort of the question that I have
9:09
Speaker 2: is I would argue, actually that an intermission would help.
9:13
Speaker 2: And the thing is they didn't shy away from intermissions
9:16
Speaker 2: in the past. I just watched Ben Hurr for the
9:18
Speaker 2: first time, and that's a long ass movie and there's
9:22
Speaker 2: an intermission. And I remember when I went to see
9:24
Speaker 2: Kenneth Brandnaw's sterling adaptation of Hamlet in the nineties, there
9:29
Speaker 2: was an intermission because everybody balked at, oh, it's four
9:32
Speaker 2: hours runtime. I really think that it's weird that people
9:35
Speaker 2: shied away from intermissions but kept the long film. I
9:39
Speaker 2: think there's an obligation on the part of the filmmakers
9:42
Speaker 2: to build in an intermission. I think that the intermission
9:45
Speaker 2: dies specifically because of the fact that we go into
9:48
Speaker 2: the multiplex era, the as many showings as possible business
9:52
Speaker 2: model era, as opposed to the I'm going out for
9:55
Speaker 2: the evening, so I'm going to take the whole evening.
9:57
Speaker 2: So if it's a long movie, though, I know I'm
9:59
Speaker 2: gonna get a fifteen minute bathroom break.
10:01
Speaker 3: I mean, like, you know, that's the interesting thing because
10:03
Speaker 3: think about it. Okay, you let's say intermissions become in
10:07
Speaker 3: vogue and in cinema and they become a thing again.
10:10
Speaker 3: Why not if you have a three hour plus movie
10:13
Speaker 3: and you have a ten twelve minute, fifteen minute intermission
10:16
Speaker 3: in the middle, people have already paid for their ticket.
10:18
Speaker 3: They're gonna come back. It's not like, oh, you're gonna
10:22
Speaker 3: lose them at the commercial break. If you have a break.
10:25
Speaker 3: It's like, no, I would be fine with that. My
10:28
Speaker 3: as my daughter and my my kids have started going
10:31
Speaker 3: to the movies more, and we just watched you know,
10:33
Speaker 3: Project hil Mary, which is a long ish movie. It's
10:35
Speaker 3: two forty She was like, oh, she she honestly thinks
10:39
Speaker 3: that the normal runtime of a movie is ninety minutes. Yeah,
10:43
Speaker 3: because the vast majority of movies she's seen have been,
10:45
Speaker 3: you know, more geared toward children and dad is and
10:49
Speaker 3: I'm like, no, I would say the average is probably
10:51
Speaker 3: more two two plus one, you know, one hundred and
10:54
Speaker 3: twenty minutes. So all that to say, I don't see
10:57
Speaker 3: why you wouldn't add add in intermissions. But I did
11:00
Speaker 3: want to say I feel the last remnant of the
11:03
Speaker 3: intermission in the modern era, and maybe there's something that
11:06
Speaker 3: that counters this is I feel like it was switching
11:10
Speaker 3: between the VHS tapes on Titanic and also putting in
11:15
Speaker 3: the second disc on the extended Lord of the Rings.
11:18
Speaker 3: Editions like those are the most recent ones I can
11:21
Speaker 3: think of where you had a physical pause.
11:24
Speaker 2: See you didn't live through the laser disc era and
11:26
Speaker 2: listen to this laser disc fans, Laser discs sucked. Okay,
11:30
Speaker 2: everybody listening to the sound of my voice. It sucked
11:32
Speaker 2: because you had to change the disc like every twenty minutes. No,
11:36
Speaker 2: no bad four.
11:37
Speaker 3: Discs and each one's double side.
11:39
Speaker 2: No four discs. Oh no, no, my friend. It was
11:42
Speaker 2: more than that. But the thing is, I think that
11:45
Speaker 2: this movie would have benefited from an intermission because it's
11:47
Speaker 2: very I would argue the style of it is very theatrical,
11:50
Speaker 2: and I mean that literally, like it it's a stage
11:53
Speaker 2: place sort of set up. There's a very Shakespearean stage
11:55
Speaker 2: place sort of approach to this in the way that
11:57
Speaker 2: it's even staged the personal scenes and stuff like that. Obviously,
12:02
Speaker 2: you can't stage horses on a beach or a giant
12:04
Speaker 2: battle like that on a stage. But it's one of
12:07
Speaker 2: those things where I think that. I think that both
12:09
Speaker 2: of us our esteem for this film would have increased
12:11
Speaker 2: with an intermission, and I think it would have changed
12:13
Speaker 2: the way Kurrosawa approached the editing of the film. And
12:17
Speaker 2: I think that it's one of those things where I
12:19
Speaker 2: just for me, it's a mental flip, But in terms
12:22
Speaker 2: of mental flip, I think that and I want to
12:24
Speaker 2: get your take on this. The back half of the
12:26
Speaker 2: movie I think really clicks in terms of there's much
12:29
Speaker 2: more dream logic. It feels like Curasawa is much It
12:32
Speaker 2: feels like he and I've made this comment about previous
12:34
Speaker 2: films that we've talked about. It feels like the beginning part,
12:37
Speaker 2: I'm sort of struggling with it. I'm trying to get there,
12:39
Speaker 2: and then suddenly there's this magic moment and it's usually
12:42
Speaker 2: about one third to halfway through where suddenly it seems
12:45
Speaker 2: to flow. He's calmed down, he's figured it out. Did
12:48
Speaker 2: you get that same sort of sense. Did the dream
12:50
Speaker 2: logic work for you in the back half of the
12:52
Speaker 2: movie or was it all a challenge?
12:54
Speaker 3: Now? I mean, are you talking about the specific dreams
12:58
Speaker 3: there is the dream sequence?
12:59
Speaker 2: Oh no, No. When I say dream logic, I'm speaking
13:02
Speaker 2: very loosely because there's a lack in the cut that
13:05
Speaker 2: I watched. There's a lack of interstitial moments where it's
13:08
Speaker 2: like scene over flip and it's a different scene. And
13:10
Speaker 2: I'm very used to a more modern sensibility of I
13:13
Speaker 2: at least get a shot of like, Okay, I close
13:16
Speaker 2: the door. I've given everybody the visual que see.
13:19
Speaker 3: Instead of it kind of flowing, it's constantly flowing. Yeah,
13:23
Speaker 3: I did. It kind of registered or didn't register for
13:27
Speaker 3: me as far as how much time was passing, because
13:30
Speaker 3: it starts in seventy one and it ends in seventy five,
13:34
Speaker 3: and I was I think they had you know, a
13:36
Speaker 3: title card or two thrown up on the screen. But
13:38
Speaker 3: besides that, it was very difficult to tell, oh, because
13:42
Speaker 3: they kept saying, oh, we're gonna hold on for three years,
13:45
Speaker 3: and I'm like, and then and then twenty minutes later
13:47
Speaker 3: it felt like it had been three days and they're like, oh, no,
13:50
Speaker 3: it's been a year. It's like it has okay, And
13:54
Speaker 3: that's where maybe an intermission in between we get you know,
13:57
Speaker 3: the setup, the warld Or dies, he's finally you know,
14:02
Speaker 3: he takes over the role. He's finally kind of through
14:05
Speaker 3: all the main hurdles of the mistresses and the grandson
14:08
Speaker 3: and the son and all of that, and then we
14:11
Speaker 3: jump to, you know, four years later, the end of
14:13
Speaker 3: the ruse, but after the intermission something more ring.
14:17
Speaker 2: Cut, right, you know, correct me if I'm wrong on this,
14:20
Speaker 2: but my memory is having watched it now, there was
14:23
Speaker 2: a lack of the famous Kurosawa wipes, the ones that
14:26
Speaker 2: Lucas fell in love with for the any wipes, Yeah,
14:29
Speaker 2: they're missing. Would that have helped? Do you think if
14:32
Speaker 2: he had hung onto that, would.
14:34
Speaker 3: That establish a change of location or time? Yeah?
14:39
Speaker 2: I suddenly realized. I suddenly realized those wipes are very
14:42
Speaker 2: helpful with the idea of like it's a it's a
14:44
Speaker 2: magician handwave where you're like, okay, something extra has had
14:49
Speaker 2: a visual beat. Yeah, it's like a fade out, fade
14:51
Speaker 2: in without fading. Would you think the film would have
14:53
Speaker 2: benefited from that? Ah?
14:55
Speaker 3: Maybe maybe at least if they had put them between
14:59
Speaker 3: the year jump, like when they jump from seventy one
15:02
Speaker 3: to seventy three and then from seventy three to seventy five.
15:05
Speaker 3: If those are the only times you had because it's
15:07
Speaker 3: always the same kind of day, it's always the same
15:10
Speaker 3: kind of season, it's always the same kind of weather
15:14
Speaker 3: and day or night like, so there was nothing really
15:18
Speaker 3: And I can't look at these characters and be like,
15:21
Speaker 3: they're older, so you're just taking the word for it
15:25
Speaker 3: where they say, oh at the bottom of the screen
15:27
Speaker 3: nineteen you know, n nineteen fifteen, you know, seventy three.
15:30
Speaker 3: I'm like, okay, sure, you know this all could have
15:33
Speaker 3: taken place in one year. You could have squished it,
15:36
Speaker 3: and I don't think it would have changed the story
15:37
Speaker 3: at all. It was the one year that he had
15:39
Speaker 3: to try to hold up the farce. Yeah, I don't know,
15:42
Speaker 3: or yeah.
15:43
Speaker 2: I mean. The thing is, it's it's frustrating for me
15:46
Speaker 2: because when it worked, it really worked for me. I
15:50
Speaker 2: really plugged into it. And I can honestly say, I'm
15:52
Speaker 2: going to watch the three hour cut to see if
15:55
Speaker 2: it helps, because I think I might wind up a
15:58
Speaker 2: little more generous with this. But one of the things,
16:01
Speaker 2: so long as we're talking about character, you had already
16:03
Speaker 2: mentioned how you know the double you know the actor
16:07
Speaker 2: who came in now famously Shintaro Katsu, was originally cast
16:11
Speaker 2: in the title role, but Katu left the production. According
16:15
Speaker 2: to Coppola because he angered Kirasawa by arriving with his
16:18
Speaker 2: own camera crew to record Courrosawa's filmmaking. Soho oop s, Wow,
16:24
Speaker 2: hey director, I'm gonna have my own camera crew filming
16:27
Speaker 2: you making the movie. I can understand why a director
16:30
Speaker 2: would have a problem with that.
16:31
Speaker 3: I could totally. I'm just picturing you in a modern
16:33
Speaker 3: setting like some like fancy actor rolling in and his
16:37
Speaker 3: posse a'll have like iPhone rigs, like those big, you know,
16:41
Speaker 3: motion rigs, and they're just filming and the director being like,
16:43
Speaker 3: what are you doing? Like get off my lot.
16:47
Speaker 2: But at the same time, you hear stories legends about
16:50
Speaker 2: like Val Kilmer shoving Joel Schumacher on the set of
16:53
Speaker 2: Batman Forever because he got frustrated with him or something
16:56
Speaker 2: like that. So who knows different director's level of zen
17:01
Speaker 2: with things. But he gets replaced by Tatsuya Nakadai, and
17:06
Speaker 2: I think both of us agree he does a great
17:08
Speaker 2: job in the role. Great job, great job in the role.
17:10
Speaker 2: Were there any other standouts here? Like for me, I'll
17:13
Speaker 2: tell you a negative standout for me was there was
17:15
Speaker 2: the one general who always dressed in red, who was
17:17
Speaker 2: always really angry about everything.
17:19
Speaker 3: That's why he's in red.
17:21
Speaker 2: Yeah, I know, but like he was like I wanted
17:23
Speaker 2: to give the guy like like slip him a gummy.
17:25
Speaker 2: I mean, like, hey, hey, it's okay to take it
17:27
Speaker 2: down one notch, chief. But were there any other standout
17:30
Speaker 2: roles here? Were there any other standout performances?
17:34
Speaker 3: I kind of liked the two attendants who were always
17:38
Speaker 3: kind of with him and helping him kind of navigate,
17:41
Speaker 3: Like when he was introduced to the house staff, Like
17:43
Speaker 3: I really liked that moment because they were all in
17:46
Speaker 3: on it, but they're also mourning their late master, and
17:50
Speaker 3: so I feel it kind of brought us a little
17:52
Speaker 3: bit back to early Kirasawa and Hidden Fortress and stuff
17:57
Speaker 3: like that. With the view through the peasants, because this
18:00
Speaker 3: whole movie is general is and up, like really like
18:03
Speaker 3: ninety percent of the movie is focused on the elite,
18:06
Speaker 3: and so when we had these moments with the house staff,
18:10
Speaker 3: I felt it really grounded the story because like there's
18:13
Speaker 3: a scene where they're all introde and then they're crying.
18:16
Speaker 3: They're actively weeping for their master. So I would have
18:21
Speaker 3: I liked those roles. I would have liked a little
18:23
Speaker 3: more of that. Maybe a little more POV in between,
18:27
Speaker 3: because it's an interesting story as so far as there's
18:33
Speaker 3: not Maybe I'm overstepping, but is there like a singular
18:36
Speaker 3: point of view in this movie?
18:39
Speaker 2: It's one of the challenges is the story revolves around Kagamusha,
18:43
Speaker 2: you know, the impost around yeah, but nobody it seems
18:47
Speaker 2: to be the title character. And that was one of
18:48
Speaker 2: the things we praised about Yo Jimbo. Very clear, this guy's.
18:51
Speaker 3: Super claracter, super clear shot.
18:54
Speaker 2: Yes, yeah, but you're absolutely right this is an ensemble cast,
18:58
Speaker 2: but not necessarily in a positive set. I struggled. I
19:01
Speaker 2: remember thinking that specifically, by about two hours in, I
19:04
Speaker 2: was like, whose story is this? Right?
19:06
Speaker 3: Who's big on the poster?
19:08
Speaker 2: But I wonder if, I mean, do you think that
19:11
Speaker 2: if we had better knowledge of Japanese history, because this
19:14
Speaker 2: is basically historical fiction, do you think that this resonates
19:17
Speaker 2: more with a Japanese audience because they know what the
19:20
Speaker 2: hell this movie is talking about? Like for us, we
19:22
Speaker 2: might plug into a movie about the Revolutionary War because
19:25
Speaker 2: it's like, yeah, we grew up in America, we know
19:26
Speaker 2: what this is about. Right, you can speak in shorthand
19:28
Speaker 2: to us. Do you think a similar sort of thing
19:30
Speaker 2: is happening here.
19:31
Speaker 3: I think you're right. I was just kind of thinking
19:33
Speaker 3: of that comparison, where if this was about all the
19:37
Speaker 3: generals that are around Washington and all of them, but
19:40
Speaker 3: we don't see Washington he's kind of alluded to, and
19:44
Speaker 3: we don't really recognize these names from history, but we know,
19:47
Speaker 3: like we know enough about American history to know, oh,
19:50
Speaker 3: I recognize that battle name, and I recognize that location,
19:54
Speaker 3: and your mind fills in all the blanks. But we
19:57
Speaker 3: don't have that for you know, I'm not up to
20:01
Speaker 3: speed on my fifteen seventies there so far. But yeah,
20:05
Speaker 3: it because even even the Sun who kind of could
20:09
Speaker 3: have taken a bit of the reins when he's finding
20:12
Speaker 3: out what's going on, but he's barely in the movie.
20:15
Speaker 3: He is so infrequently in a shot that yeah, it's
20:20
Speaker 3: just like you said, it's an ensemble piece, but not
20:22
Speaker 3: necessarily in the right way. I mean, think of other
20:26
Speaker 3: ensemble movies like Lord of the Rings. You can still
20:30
Speaker 3: on an individual movie basis, see the even when they're
20:34
Speaker 3: breaking the fellowship or going in different directions, you know
20:37
Speaker 3: who's running each party. You're like, Okay, this is Gandalf's track,
20:41
Speaker 3: This is Frodo's track, this is air Gorn's track. Like
20:44
Speaker 3: that is very clear that is not the case, at
20:47
Speaker 3: least in my viewing of this.
20:49
Speaker 2: See that's interesting because it's one of the things I
20:51
Speaker 2: struggle with in the cut that I watched. You struggle
20:54
Speaker 2: with it in the cut that you watch. So obviously
20:56
Speaker 2: the extra twenty minutes doesn't make a difference in those
20:58
Speaker 2: in that sense, which is unforse to me. But you know,
21:02
Speaker 2: talking about that, we alluded to the fact that it
21:04
Speaker 2: co won the Palm Door in nineteen eighty. This is
21:08
Speaker 2: a highly regarded film, and obviously we have our issues
21:12
Speaker 2: with it going you know, going along so far. My
21:16
Speaker 2: question is, you know, sort of a role play sort
21:18
Speaker 2: of thing. When I love something and people don't, I
21:21
Speaker 2: try to understand what they did and love about it,
21:23
Speaker 2: Like Megalopolis would be a great thing. Like my famous
21:26
Speaker 2: line about that is I either loved it so much
21:28
Speaker 2: that I hated it, or I hated it so much
21:30
Speaker 2: that I loved it. I don't know where I stand
21:31
Speaker 2: with it, but I can't forget it sort of thing,
21:33
Speaker 2: and so I try to put in my brain and
21:35
Speaker 2: I'm like, oh, I totally get why people hated it.
21:37
Speaker 2: Is this something where you, even if it didn't connect
21:39
Speaker 2: with you completely, with all of the you know, the
21:41
Speaker 2: flaws that we've talked about, is this one where you
21:43
Speaker 2: can look at it and go, oh, I get it.
21:45
Speaker 2: I know why critics loved this. I know why Pauline
21:48
Speaker 2: Kale of The New York Times raved about this. I
21:50
Speaker 2: know this why this won the Palm Door. I know
21:53
Speaker 2: why the Hollywood Reporter ranked this as tenth among the
21:56
Speaker 2: sixty nine Palmdoor winners. I know why this was. I
22:02
Speaker 2: think this is the number one Japanese film on the
22:04
Speaker 2: domestic market in nineteen eighty. So basically this film has
22:08
Speaker 2: tons of praise, tons of awards, baf TO Awards, it
22:12
Speaker 2: has you know, Can Film Festival. It was nominated for
22:15
Speaker 2: Best Foreign Language Film in the Academy Awards and Best
22:18
Speaker 2: Art Direction. Do you see what the critics saw or
22:20
Speaker 2: is this one where you're sort of like, yeah, I
22:23
Speaker 2: don't know, guys, I'm just not connecting with it.
22:26
Speaker 3: No, I do. I mean, it is a well executed film.
22:30
Speaker 3: It's clear on its story as far as you know
22:33
Speaker 3: where it's taking us. I love that it's in color,
22:36
Speaker 3: especially because of the use of color of all the
22:39
Speaker 3: different divisions, like that whole ending sequence would have made
22:42
Speaker 3: any sense if it was like the bluish gray and
22:45
Speaker 3: then the darkish gray and then the lightish gray all
22:49
Speaker 3: go to their death. It just is not as impact.
22:52
Speaker 3: Like I love the motifs of his symbol, the four
22:56
Speaker 3: diamonds being you know, earth, you know, Scott or was
22:59
Speaker 3: it water fire mountain or water mountain, Yes, you know,
23:04
Speaker 3: not quite the fifth element. But but I liked that.
23:09
Speaker 3: I felt that worked. I felt but I feel that
23:14
Speaker 3: this is a little more of a product of its time.
23:18
Speaker 3: Where you're in the nineteen eighty you're coming off of
23:22
Speaker 3: the late seventies. You know, this is a Kirasawa film.
23:26
Speaker 3: It goes into all the right places, it's in color,
23:30
Speaker 3: all of these checkboxes, versus you could think of another
23:33
Speaker 3: movie like in the seventies, like a Western and the
23:36
Speaker 3: age of Western, like when those movies came out. It
23:39
Speaker 3: just the fact that it was a Western, it was
23:40
Speaker 3: great and people raved about it. But or a musical
23:43
Speaker 3: in the height of musical. So I'm just saying genre wise,
23:47
Speaker 3: I think that helped it in its moment, because that
23:50
Speaker 3: was kind of the moment that that genre was having.
23:53
Speaker 3: Whereas looking at it now, for me, I don't. I'm
23:57
Speaker 3: not giving it those extra brownie points for being in
24:00
Speaker 3: that genre right now because that's not what is the
24:04
Speaker 3: main genre right now. So but I do see, you know,
24:08
Speaker 3: when we quibble over length or or protagonist confusion or
24:12
Speaker 3: things like that, you know as core. Though this is
24:14
Speaker 3: still you know, better than other things I've seen. It
24:17
Speaker 3: was still an interesting story. Like I said, I was
24:20
Speaker 3: engaged the entire time. I just wanted it to move
24:23
Speaker 3: a little faster.
24:24
Speaker 2: So, you know, we love to talk about music on
24:27
Speaker 2: our way past third as it were, So I got
24:29
Speaker 2: to ask you, do you consider this a successful score?
24:33
Speaker 3: Score is a big word for for this. I mean,
24:37
Speaker 3: it's the music's there, but it does not. I think
24:40
Speaker 3: we really peaked in score last week with you Jimbo,
24:45
Speaker 3: which even though I wasn't as sold on it, you
24:47
Speaker 3: and test In were raving for like ten minutes about
24:51
Speaker 3: the score and this one it's it's there. I could
24:54
Speaker 3: have used maybe more music from the period would have
24:59
Speaker 3: been an take. I felt like it was a fairly
25:02
Speaker 3: like the type of instruments used were more on the
25:05
Speaker 3: modern side for something in the fifteen hundreds or sixteen hundreds.
25:09
Speaker 3: But yeah, so there was no at least from my memory,
25:14
Speaker 3: there was no like motif of the general like that
25:16
Speaker 3: always played when so and so came on screen. Right,
25:19
Speaker 3: there are things like that to tie you together. And
25:22
Speaker 3: when there's no motifs, not that every movie has to
25:24
Speaker 3: have motifs, but when there's no motif then I look
25:27
Speaker 3: at the music to be an indicator of what I
25:31
Speaker 3: should feel in the moment. It's like, Okay, should I
25:34
Speaker 3: feel excited for this or happy for this? And that
25:37
Speaker 3: was there, but the real feeling of motivation or emotion
25:43
Speaker 3: in the moments was from the acting. I mean, I
25:46
Speaker 3: think the greatest moment of that is when he's trying
25:49
Speaker 3: to convince them that he can impersonate the warlord and
25:52
Speaker 3: kind of pulls around the little table and kind of
25:55
Speaker 3: leans his arm on it and took like that motion.
25:57
Speaker 3: That's part of that scene was the strongest scene of
26:01
Speaker 3: the whole movie, But it wasn't ratified by a score
26:05
Speaker 3: in that moment.
26:06
Speaker 2: It's a good way to put that. I agree. I mean,
26:09
Speaker 2: the music's there, but like there were certain moments where
26:11
Speaker 2: I was like, this doesn't feel right for the period
26:14
Speaker 2: that it's discussing, and that's sort of where I struggled
26:17
Speaker 2: with it. But you know, I mean, what do I know?
26:19
Speaker 2: It was beloved by critics and the can Film Festival.
26:22
Speaker 2: So I'm just a simple moviegoer.
26:24
Speaker 3: You know.
26:25
Speaker 2: Hey, well what.
26:26
Speaker 3: We've said before. I mean, again, nothing against film festivals,
26:30
Speaker 3: but any sort of award you have to also contextualize
26:33
Speaker 3: what was it up against, because there could be I mean,
26:36
Speaker 3: nineteen eighty there's a lot of good movies out, but
26:39
Speaker 3: they're also for what it's up against. Especially if it's
26:42
Speaker 3: in a foreign language category, there could be less competition.
26:45
Speaker 3: I'm just stating that that is part of award shows.
26:49
Speaker 3: Who you're against is definitely at least half the equation.
26:53
Speaker 2: So here we are, we've both never seen it before.
26:56
Speaker 2: I say this is a good point to offer our
26:58
Speaker 2: ratings and reviews or final thoughts. I should say, so
27:02
Speaker 2: I will go first. I will give you the pleasure
27:04
Speaker 2: of going last. For me, this is a film that
27:07
Speaker 2: I struggle with. I think that the first I'd say
27:11
Speaker 2: forty minutes, I was like, I kind of know what's
27:13
Speaker 2: going on. As I said about previous Kurrosawa films, I
27:17
Speaker 2: feel like if I knew Japanese and or Japanese history better.
27:21
Speaker 2: I would enjoy it more. I think that the subtitles
27:24
Speaker 2: in the version that I watched were garbage. There was
27:26
Speaker 2: actually there were actually two moments where I caught misspellings
27:31
Speaker 2: in the subtitles and I said, oh, okay, they didn't
27:35
Speaker 2: care enough on this one, okay, which is another reason
27:38
Speaker 2: I want to watch the Criterion collection because I want
27:41
Speaker 2: to believe, in my heart of hearts, the Criterion paid
27:42
Speaker 2: more attention to the subtitles, so maybe there's something that
27:45
Speaker 2: I didn't get that even you did. All that said,
27:48
Speaker 2: there are moments that are absolutely magical in this. I
27:51
Speaker 2: think that once it unlocks that comfort level, and I
27:54
Speaker 2: think the dream sequence is one of those most comfortable
27:57
Speaker 2: levels of editing and filmmaking where it's very obviously stage
28:01
Speaker 2: play the way that it is, but that dream sequence
28:03
Speaker 2: is beautiful to watch. I think there are beautiful sequences
28:06
Speaker 2: here and there. There are great things, but it's not
28:10
Speaker 2: terribly cohesive. So I wind up coming in with a
28:13
Speaker 2: three on my first viewing. I think there's room to grow.
28:15
Speaker 2: I'm a weird one. I might watch a twenty minute
28:17
Speaker 2: longer and I'm either going to go two stars or
28:19
Speaker 2: four stars with it. It's going to depend maybe on my
28:22
Speaker 2: mood as well. So three stars for me. Where do
28:24
Speaker 2: you land with Kagamusha, the final film that we will
28:27
Speaker 2: be discussing here in the House of Kurosawa, Yeah.
28:30
Speaker 3: I too, really liked the dream sequence, the kind of
28:34
Speaker 3: force perspective of he's obviously on a stage, but it's
28:37
Speaker 3: meant to be a miniasturization of the land and the
28:40
Speaker 3: little hills as he walks over them. And I love
28:43
Speaker 3: the backdrop. Like however they were lighting it, I don't
28:46
Speaker 3: even know, but it was almost kind of a self
28:48
Speaker 3: lit like a layer of neon or something was behind
28:52
Speaker 3: a painting and it just glowed in this interesting way
28:55
Speaker 3: that wasn't projection. It was something else but and you know,
29:00
Speaker 3: lightly different frame rates and the way he moves, and
29:02
Speaker 3: I like the symmetry of him, you know, falling into
29:04
Speaker 3: the water and then that's how he died, like falling
29:07
Speaker 3: into the river in the end, So yeah, that was Yeah.
29:11
Speaker 3: Once he breaks open that jar and it's like, oh
29:14
Speaker 3: that's where they put the dead general, it's like, oh
29:17
Speaker 3: my gosh. But yeah, it is just one of those
29:20
Speaker 3: things where they did a lot of things right where
29:25
Speaker 3: they invested a lot of time in all the generals,
29:27
Speaker 3: and they invested like they put all the pieces where
29:30
Speaker 3: they should, but it was still really long, like I think,
29:35
Speaker 3: and maybe that's just a modern sensibility looking at it
29:38
Speaker 3: or modern film techniques, but I think I think it
29:41
Speaker 3: would have been interesting to and maybe this is what happened.
29:45
Speaker 3: I'm just misremembering, But you have the three generals that
29:48
Speaker 3: are the three colors, and then there's like the lead
29:51
Speaker 3: general who's also kind of was his double for a
29:55
Speaker 3: little while but wasn't, which also kind of confused things
29:57
Speaker 3: a little bit because he also kind of looked like him.
30:00
Speaker 3: But really focus on those guys, like I think those
30:04
Speaker 3: four should have been the only ones in council at
30:06
Speaker 3: any given time. No one else is in the room,
30:08
Speaker 3: like really hone it down, And maybe that's not that'd
30:11
Speaker 3: be like, oh, you wouldn't have a meeting of the
30:14
Speaker 3: US generals with only three generals there. It's like, maybe
30:17
Speaker 3: you're right, and maybe for historical accuracy it should have
30:21
Speaker 3: been there. But so overall, you know, I enjoyed this story.
30:25
Speaker 3: I think honestly, maybe watching it in a dub would
30:28
Speaker 3: have been easier to consume in a first bite because
30:32
Speaker 3: I don't know about you, but this whole house has
30:34
Speaker 3: been It is an extra bit of effort, like watching
30:37
Speaker 3: a movie only in a dub, not dubb only with subtitles,
30:41
Speaker 3: because you have to be extremely focused the entire time
30:46
Speaker 3: to even know what is going on. Yep, and that
30:49
Speaker 3: is a struggle sometimes, especially on a three hour movie.
30:53
Speaker 3: So I'm going to give this two stars. I think
30:56
Speaker 3: it especially now a lot of Kirasawa for me is
31:00
Speaker 3: been in fours and fives. It's been a great time
31:04
Speaker 3: viewing and getting a slice of his filmography. There's more
31:07
Speaker 3: to discover. There's more out there. We covered only a
31:09
Speaker 3: fraction of it. But and I don't see this as
31:12
Speaker 3: oh Kirasol was diminishing as he hit the eighties note
31:16
Speaker 3: not in the slightest. But for me and my take,
31:19
Speaker 3: you know, maybe I want to try to find a
31:21
Speaker 3: more modern subject that he covers versus period because we've
31:24
Speaker 3: seen a lot. Everything's been period.
31:26
Speaker 2: High and low. Again, I say hi, And of course
31:30
Speaker 2: we don't have any official transmission from Tristan, but I
31:33
Speaker 2: think we're confident in saying that he gave this five stars.
31:36
Speaker 2: And so Tristan is the outlier on this one. He
31:38
Speaker 2: gave it five stars. He loved it, and I'm gonna
31:41
Speaker 2: I know Tristan very well. You know Tristan very well.
31:43
Speaker 2: I'd say five stars is a fair guest. And probably
31:46
Speaker 2: he especially loved the editing on this and felt that
31:50
Speaker 2: they probably could have gone for a whole other twenty
31:53
Speaker 2: or forty minutes beyond the runtime, regardless of which cut
31:56
Speaker 2: that you watch, knowing Tristan as we do. But Darren,
31:59
Speaker 2: this closes out the House of Kurosawa. What lay in
32:03
Speaker 2: the future Next week for.
32:04
Speaker 3: Us, well, we're going to go into an amazing house
32:08
Speaker 3: of Jonathan Lynn, whereas we're calling it a palate cleanser.
32:12
Speaker 3: Just enjoy something fun. We're going to cover a couple
32:15
Speaker 3: of his movies from the eighties, nineties, and two thousands,
32:18
Speaker 3: starting with nineteen eighty five's Clue. Next on House
32:22
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