Kurosawa and the Two Classes of Great Films

It seems to be the case that when one lists the greatest films of all time there are two classes into which they must be divided, which for simplicity's sake I will refer to as the technical and the emotional. By the technical I mean those films that exemplify certain filmmaking techniques perfectly, inventing a few along the way. You cannot deny their excellence, but upon repeated viewings, there seems to be something missing. By the emotional I mean a film that may lack certain technical aspects, it my have a diminished level of pacing, or the cinematography could be sub-par. But the experience you have from watching the film, and the experiences the characters undergo within serves a greater purpose, one depicting empathetically the whole of humanity. These films seek to elucidate some hidden truth among the rubble of our lives, to find the elusive diamonds in the rough. Akira Kurosawa, one of the greatest of the Japanese directors, never fails to have his films included in a top 100 list; perhaps it is because he has mastered both forms. In particular, his films Rashomon and Ikiru fit into these categories quite comfortably.

Rashomon is resoundingly in the first category, the technical. It has cinematography that is, for lack of a better word, mind blowing; it has dialogue that, if one were so inclined, could be quoted all day long. The images presented on screen are some of the most poignant ever, not to mention the fact that either Kurosawa or Miyagawa (his cinematographer) had the inspiration to point the camera at the sun, blinding its audiences with an image never before seen. The film is largely about a trial that took place earlier in the day and is being recounted by a character known simply as the woodcutter. The trial seeks to resolve what took place in the woods where a samurai was found dead and his wife raped. The first testimony comes from the bandit, who is proud of having fought and beaten the samurai and raped his wife. The wife then claims that she accidentally killed him. A medium is brought in who, channelling the spirit of the dead samurai, claims that he committed Hara Kiri after his wife's dignity was stolen. Then at the end the woodcutter, who has told us this entire story, has been shown to also be a bit dishonest in his retelling. It is largely a film about truth and justice, with large philosophical ramifications, but it lacks a certain human element. It is about the big ideas, but seemingly avoids more emotional issues. Guilt surfaces once, and the last scene has a human element to it, but the film at large depicts little of this.

Ikiru, on the other hand, is about a man who decided to live deliberately. When he finds out he has stomach cancer, Kanji Watanabe undergoes several stages of coping with it. After he battles the depression that is crushing him, he decides to truly live, to be alive and to feel this life coursing through his veins for one night. After that night, he continues doing things that he has always wanted to do, but it dawns on him that this is only temporal, this will all be forgotten when he dies. So he goes back to his job at the department of public affairs, where nothing ever happens due to the lethargic state of the internal bureaucracy. There he decides to accomplish something, to do something for other people, and he finds a petition for a park to be built over an old sewage dump. He makes it his life goal to get this park built. When it is finally finished, he goes to the park in the middle of winter to die, because at that point his life is complete.

Now both of these films are excellent in their own ways, the determining factor is individual taste. I personally prefer Ikiru, but many of my friends prefer Rashomon. They each have their faults, but so does every film. The question of which one is better is not one that can ever be easily answered, I always say between these that they are two different types of films, and must each be taken as their own thing. They each tap into human truths, they each have philosophical questions and answers, but they differ on a technical level.

It would seem, therefore, to make a film that could exist in both realms, that could spout pearls of wisdom, that could be a fount of human emotion and transcend the boundary between the technical and the emotional. Is this even possible? It seems the only way to prove it is would be to provide some examples. Raging Bull crosses this line, its dialogue and camera movements, its score and De Niro's acting, all raise it to the peak of technical creation, and yet it oozes out a thick tar-like substance that is Jake LaMotta's soul, we peer in and see the bubbling boiling rage inside of him and recognize the human aspects of the character that could have been easily portrayed as pure evil. This film does manage to fuse the two to create a portrait of a man that is astounding in both its precision and sympathy. Does that make this film better? I think it does, but as I have said in a previous essay, the real determining factor in deciding a films greatness lies completely outside of the film itself. It is based solely on how it effects you, the audience, how it complements your experiences, how it outlines your philosophy, how it puts words and images to your thoughts. A film is like a mirror, the greatest ones are the ones that allow you to see more of yourself in them.