[March 23 1910, legendary filmmaker Akira Kurosawa was born. To celebrate the centennial of his life, his prolific contributions to the world of cinema, and immense impact on the hearts and minds of those quietly mourning his absence, staffers at Row Three are (rather enthusiastically) taking this opportunity to share their own experiences of the Kurosawa catalogue]
Akira Kurosawa’s Red Beard is the sweet spot of my cinema viewing experience, I consider it to be the best film I have ever had the privilege of seeing. It is hard for me to talk sensibly about the film without gushing, when something hits me this hard the rigor of description gives way to a want of confession. I was never much of a theist, and am for the most part disparaging towards the cult of humanity, but there are a scattered few master artisans which I feel holds more for me than any God could, and Kurosawa is among that legion. To me Kurosawa was Red Beard, and as much as the story is about so many other things, it speaks also to me of a depth of humanity and common decency that charts throughout his ubiquitous career, here culminating in one formidable persona, the titular head doctor around whom the world surely pivots.
The samurai swords are for the most part set aside in this epic drama about, on the surface at least, the moral duty of medical practitioners in a rural clinic during the end of Tokugawa period Japan. It tells the story of a young doctor, Noboru Yasumoto, who has been appointed to an unglamorous position remedying the poor at the behest of the principled but stubborn head doctor, Red Beard. It is a familiar coming of age story, teacher inspires pupil to a life of virtue, and on the surface it is very much an ordinary story. It is the details (and in the Criterion essay Donald Ritchie speaks of the ‘patina’ of the film, that of the look, but, I would argue also, the feel, a grit nestled in crevices) which makes this film extraordinary.
Kurosawa was a massive fan of Dostoevsky, and made a fairly mediocre film adaptation of his novel, The Idiot. It is Red Beard, however, that feels the most Dostoevskian of Kurosawa’s films. Here too, characters wantonly express their sorrows and speak of darker human actions than traditional cinema is accustomed to; here too, the naked expressions of emotion form beneath feverish brows while the harsh realities of life stand in absurd juxtaposition with civic orthodoxy. At it’s most tragic, Kurosawa interjects a dying man’s story midway through the film which takes on a stillborn life of it’s own within the dreary confines of the clinic, in a way that so reminds me of fragments of The Idiot that I am sure the spirit of Dostoevsky was foremost in Kurosawa’s mind upon writing and directing it.
Red Beard’s clinic is run like a monastery, the spiritual analogue is not far from the surface throughout, but for Yasumoto this is no easy ascension. There is grit and indulgence in the ways that emotions spill out of this story. To borrow from Whitman, Red Beard is the kind of film that contains multitudes, the feelings it evoke about how to live quiver from the stoic to the heartfelt, the gushing to the clinical, it unsettles by its emotional complexity. The conventional story beats are there, but it is how out of proportion its realism gets in tandem with these conventions that stir, at least for me, an awakening of spirit. It breaks the boundaries of a film while seeming not to, it feigns meek and understandable, and in the corners of its narrative beats an intractable heart.
Of course, the craftsmanship of Red Beard is also impeccable. Kurosawa’s mis-en-scene is a tableau upon which every necessary piece of information is supplied in order to enhance the dramatic impetus of the scene. Every detail is a cue for the viewer’s eye to discern the meaning of events in this world of pure cinema. In contradistinction to the pure cinema of Alfred Hitchcock, Kurosawa’s supplies the emotional underpinnings of the scenes going beyond the requirements of plot progression. There is a tenderness which I sometimes feel Western artists have greater difficulty depicting, a precarious balance between melodrama as decadence and melodrama as just a different lens to experience drama through. My ideal cinematic aesthetic leans towards realism, however, as the works of Kurosawa have showed me, the same depth of experience can be earned through an explicit artifice that is nonetheless so finely managed that it papers over the cracks left revealed by lesser films. The restraint from overt musical cues and teary-eyed close-ups are perhaps part of the distinction from Kurosawa’s kind of melodrama, there is little pandering to the audience, and yet when license is taken to emphasize a certain point explicitly, with the mode of acting, lighting, or camera angle, it is done not as a short cut to the desired response, but as a culmination of the response already earned.
And then there is Toshiro Mifune in the principal role as the wise old sensei, Red Beard. Mifune feels larger than life to me in a way that no other actor-celebrity seems. Some director’s commentaries I have listened to remark that Toshiro Mifune lacked a certain polish to his acting which in films outside Kurosawa became more noticeable; and I think Toshiro illustrates a point I have made previous: it is not always the acting that makes the part but the actor, the living being that that person is needs to be considered as part of the value of the performance. It is the aura of Toshiro Mifune more so than any skill of acting that makes him great.
Hyperbolic praise will never suffice for the genuine feeling I have for Kurosawa and Toshiro, and in particular, this film of theirs, the last black and white film they made together, the very pinnacle of their success.
I definitely agree with this review. Red Beard is one of Kurosawa’s very best films, and terribly underrated. Sometimes I even think it ranks higher than Seven Samurai.
To me Seven Samurai is Kurosawa’s most perfectly made film, but I think by virtue of the emotional impact, Red Beard is his best, or at least the best of the ones I have seen. I have not yet seen Dodes’ka-den which you have reviewed… I really need to get on it.
I also enjoy in Red Beard that even though this is a wrought medical drama, Mifune still gets an opportunity to do a Yojimbo-like ass-kicking. That just makes me smile.
Me too, man. Me too. AND not only does it pop up in a medical drama, but it’s so awesomely brutal!
Just caught this film. It’s the superhero film with Mifune being somewhere between socrates and superman, and the villain is the ‘worst traits of humanity’
Common decency indeed, this film makes you want to be a better person after watching it. I think we have it TOO GOOD. Wow!
aside from the amazing story within the story (seen in the image above) the other stand out scene is Noboru watching the old man die… Criterion had asked for the best Kurosawa moment for a chance to win the Kurosawa collection, and I don’t know, how that scene plays out, Noboru’s reaction to the old man, it is transcendent cinema.
Just saw this as well and there are so many moments that could qualify as contest entries – the ass-kicking is so perfectly placed in the movie and is topped off by Red Beard’s comments about going a bit overboard; the introduction of Otoyo in complete shadow; the side view of the first dying man; the crazy woman attacking Noburo; the pan from looking up from inside the well to the reflection at the bottom; etc.
The movie does definitely hit certain beats and you can guess how several events will play out – but in almost all of those cases I would have been supremely disappointed had they NOT played out as I expected. It’s a wonderful trick Kurosawa manages to pull.
as I said in the review, it contains multitudes… its three hours and it packs enough stuff in that three hours to fill six!
It’s a feel good movie in the sense that despite the poverty, the ugliness of humanity and all that, there are both people fighting-the-good-fight and passing the mantle down.
it’s always interesting politically in how populist it is while at the same time being smart and provocative. What a wonderful way to spend 3.25 hours. As I said before, you come out determined to be both thankful for what you have, and the desire to be a much better person.
At three hours it is indeed way to short. Where is some ambitious creator to do and update/remake (set in the same era would be awesome though!) for HBO. 3-4 seasons at 12 hours per season. Heaven.
it doesn’t sugar coat the ugliness though, which I still say is the Dostoevky fan in him shining through. People in this film live miserable lives, the world has beat many of them down, and nothing ultimately justifies their misery. The transformation of Noboru feels earned, he has come to terms with the ugliness of reality and that the most he can do in the world is be there for the people most in need. All the pretenses are gone, all the notions of honor and status, and there is just being there for whomever needs you. Like I say in the review, the spiritual monastic layer is not far from the surface, and I am not a particularly religious person, but I don’t know, something about this universe with Toshiro Mifune at the center of it, feels right, feels good, and I can totally see how Noboru succumbs to it. This is a cynical world, and spirituality, at least in the West, is derided a lot for its supposed naiveté… but a film like Red Beard depicts it in a way that makes sense. Dostoevsky was a religious man but his too, like Kurosawa’s, had a strong humanist bent… its not about ritual and dogma but embodying the good in the world. It is simplistic but profound in its simplicity, the deception is thinking complexity is of hierarchal significance in its own right.
its called ER
“its called ER”
SERIOUS? I’m skeptical that any sort of nuance or humanism (with equal parts cynicism and earnestness in perfect balance) was present in ER.
I was kidding, forgot the smiley
Ok, the world makes a lot more sense now.
I think you’ve put your finger on how something that is on the surface just a morality play, good vs. evil, gets transformed into greatness. I show the film in class every year, because it is one of the greats, but also because it helps explain so much about Edo-period society, Dutch medicine, class, you name it. And, of course, it has the greatest Japanese actor of the 20th century in it and was directed by the greatest Japanese director of the 20th century. You might be able to cut the word “Japanese” from the previous sentence.
Over the Christmas holidays I plan to gorge myself on Kurosawa films, awaiting the 25 disc Criterion box set from Barnes & Noble. There are a few gaps in my knowledge of his films, will see if anything shines as brightly as Red Beard… I highly doubt it.