Akira Kurosawa and Yojimbo

Kurosawa as a dialectical filmmaker

• his works are open-ended
• Belongs in the pantheon of great Japanese directors like Yasujiro Ozu and Kenji Mizoguchi.
• The films do not advance an ideological position that the film can be simply reduced to
• “Of course, I’m concerned with the moral responsibility of a creator, but without expressing it in such an obvious way.  This feeling of responsibility developed in me through being a Japanese and a man.  Without my being aware of it, it penetrates my films.”  (Mesnil, Kurosawa pp 102-103)

That dialectical nature is what makes something:

• complex
• art
• history
• have an effect on history

How is Kurosawa an outsider?

Too much of a non-intellectual style (in opposition to political cinema)

• broadest audience possible – good or bad?

Too Western

• Tropes and techniques from Westerns, et al
• Demanding and unharmonious nature
• Critical of Japan

Too difficult

• Large budgets
• Overbearing on actors and crew
• Too depressing
• Too individualistic

Kuosawa constructs “a cinema of ideas in which human capabilities are defined as open-ended and developing, rather than closed, sealed by sets of institutional and social roles.”

• “the adventure story becomes a metaphorical form probing the boundaries of the social world, the construction of the self, and the horizons of human development.”

Yojimbo

Family

• cold, malignant, or repressive
• Characters must break from these groups to discover a regard for human dignity
• However, they never reject the basic need to be connected to others

Time period

• Somewhat fluid class boundaries because of the breakdown at the end of the Tokugawa Era
• Samurai could become farmers and farmers could become warriors
• Economy shifted to money, not rice
• Ties mediated by the exchange of commodities, not personal allegiances and obligations

A fable about the end of capitalism

• Merchants are destroyed by the class they displaced
• Sanjuro not driven by any ethics or morals
• Sanjuro as director – arranging and manipulating events as if writing a screenplay
• We (the audience) only know what Sanjuro knows
• This establishes a reciprocity
  • Family conference (overheard)
  • End massacre only shifts into view when we see it.
  • Early morning meeting occurs w/o him, but then he comes down from the tower and we realize he’s been there all along
  • Capitalism at the end is destroyed, but at the expense of everything else.
  • Corrupting influence of money vs. purifications of ritual violence

Yojimbo Characters

Ushitora - Gambling

• Tokuemon - Sake Merchant
• Unosuke - brother
• Inokichi - brother

Seibei - Brothel Owner

• Tazaemon - Silk Merchant
• Orin - wife
• Yoichiro - son

Yojimbo Themes:

• Capitalism Run Amok (3:44)
  • silk fair
  • illegal business
  • gangsters

• Family Values
  • Farming Family (3:44)
  • Seibei's Family (Chapter 5, 20:58)

• The Law of Lawlessness
  • The officer
  • The visting official (chapter 7, 32:00)

• Loyalty
  • Who is Sanjuro supposed to be loyal to now?

• "One major human problem is that it is almost possible to remain uninvolved with other humans and at the same time it is almost impossible to be enough involved."  Donald Richie

Kurosawa's Techniques:

• Music and Imagery
  • Dog with hand (6:38)
  • Theme Music
• Deep Focus
  • Keeping foreground and background in focus at the same time (chapter 7, 32:00)
  • Different effects - fight scene (Chapter 6, 30:45)
• The Wipe
  • (20:58)
  • acts as a curtain of sorts
• Natural Elements
  • Unosuke's Entrance
  • When does the movie occur?
• Authentic sets and costumes
  • Always part of a Kurosawa production
• Staging
  • Right Angles
  • Set one street
  • Fight Scene with Yojimbo watching

Other Films:

Sanshiro Sugata

Ikiru

Seven Samurai

Outside Sources:

Short Documentary on Influence and Influences: One and Two.

Critical Reading of Yojimbo:

"Yojimbo is a purposely-inflated satiric comedy that takes to task the capitalist motives that sprang up with emergence of a middle class in Japan."

Roger Ebert's take on the movie:

"The samurai were famed for their unyielding loyalty to their employers, but Sanjuro, finding himself unemployed because of the collapse of the feudal system, becomes a modern man and is able to manipulate both sides because they persist in thinking he will be faithful to those who pay him."

A very informed reading from a blog:

"It would be better, though, were we to see that the farmers and artisans left behind by the collapse of the last Japanese Dynasty made the people, in this time of sorrow and change, his new and implicitly truest royalty."

Biography of Akira Kurosawa

Biography of Toshiro Mifune

Youtube: Lady Snowblood, Fists of Fury, Kill Bill

Kurosawa's Suntory Whiskey Ads