- I'm interested in the topic (AKA -"wow, that looks like something I'd enjoy!")
- I'm a fan of the major actors (AKA -"Jimmy Stewart is in this! Squeeeee!")
- I'm with a group of friends, and they all insist on watching some terrible movie against my opinionated, yet correct, urging. (and that is how I was forced to watch the horrendous Wild Wild West more than once.)
- It is made by a great director. (and thus I will watch anything that Christopher Nolan has made.)
We all have favorite directors. My all time favorite has always been Alfred Hitchcock. I've loved Alfred the Great since I first really encountered his work in high school.
But right now I want to talk about a director that I've only recently discovered that has simply amazed me with his work. I'm speaking of Akira Kurosawa.
I discovered Kurosawa in watching his magnificent epic Seven Samurai. I'd long heard of SS, knowing how influential it was and how it was remade in America as the western The Magnificent Seven. If you've heard of Seven Samurai and have not seen it, forget everything you have ever been told -it is far better than you could imagine. It really deserves its own review sometime, but now suffice to say this; it is more magnificent than any remake.
Of course, one great film does not mean that a director is great. Even bad directors sometimes strike gold, or as they say, even a blind squirrel can find a nut. That is why I decided to check out more of Kurosawa's work. Thus I watched Ran (the character "ran" in Japanese means something like "rebellion" or "betrayal"), Kurosawa's Japanese Samurai adaptation of Shakespeare's King Lear. If you're thinking that Samurai King Lear sounds awesome, that's because it is (and again, the sweepingly brilliant Ran deserves its own review). Then I bought and watched The Hidden Fortress, a film that had strong influence over George Lucas as he wrote Star Wars. There I marveled at Kurosawa's ability to develop strong characters and slowly ramp up action, then bring together action and tension in completely stunning ways.
It hit me sometime after watching The Hidden Fortress that I was becoming an enormous fan of Akira Kurosawa. Clearly he had a pattern of greatness, evident even in the three that I saw at first. If you think of great film making, nobody thinks of Japanese flicks from the 50's. Yet in that period Kurosawa was making films that were not just better than what Hollywood was producing, they profoudly changed movie making itself. The preeminent example is 1950's Rashomon, which was the single most influential film in bringing Japanese cinema to the West.
Kurosawa became friends with the American western director John Ford. He was highly influenced by Ford's work, and then Kurosawa's work highly influenced Ford (and everyone else). For myself, I know that my appreciation of good film has been enhanced since running into Kurosawa's work. He was a genius, far ahead of his time, who made films that have simply made me sit back in wonder.
Watch out Hitchcock, Akira is gunning for your spot on my favorites list.
I discovered Kurosawa in watching his magnificent epic Seven Samurai. I'd long heard of SS, knowing how influential it was and how it was remade in America as the western The Magnificent Seven. If you've heard of Seven Samurai and have not seen it, forget everything you have ever been told -it is far better than you could imagine. It really deserves its own review sometime, but now suffice to say this; it is more magnificent than any remake.
Of course, one great film does not mean that a director is great. Even bad directors sometimes strike gold, or as they say, even a blind squirrel can find a nut. That is why I decided to check out more of Kurosawa's work. Thus I watched Ran (the character "ran" in Japanese means something like "rebellion" or "betrayal"), Kurosawa's Japanese Samurai adaptation of Shakespeare's King Lear. If you're thinking that Samurai King Lear sounds awesome, that's because it is (and again, the sweepingly brilliant Ran deserves its own review). Then I bought and watched The Hidden Fortress, a film that had strong influence over George Lucas as he wrote Star Wars. There I marveled at Kurosawa's ability to develop strong characters and slowly ramp up action, then bring together action and tension in completely stunning ways.
It hit me sometime after watching The Hidden Fortress that I was becoming an enormous fan of Akira Kurosawa. Clearly he had a pattern of greatness, evident even in the three that I saw at first. If you think of great film making, nobody thinks of Japanese flicks from the 50's. Yet in that period Kurosawa was making films that were not just better than what Hollywood was producing, they profoudly changed movie making itself. The preeminent example is 1950's Rashomon, which was the single most influential film in bringing Japanese cinema to the West.
Kurosawa became friends with the American western director John Ford. He was highly influenced by Ford's work, and then Kurosawa's work highly influenced Ford (and everyone else). For myself, I know that my appreciation of good film has been enhanced since running into Kurosawa's work. He was a genius, far ahead of his time, who made films that have simply made me sit back in wonder.
Watch out Hitchcock, Akira is gunning for your spot on my favorites list.
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