Welcome to The Final Four (ROUND FIVE) of the RowThree March Madness pool! The four divisions of contenders have finally come together looking to advance to the championship game. It’s up to you to decide who advances. Look through each bracket within all five divisions and make your choice. After a few days the polls will close and we’ll see who advances to the next round. There can be only one victor. (Note: there is a fifth set of brackets we’re calling the Consolation Division – a group of 16 directors we really wanted to see compete but weren’t quite “worthy” of the big dance. This round is now over – see the results below).
We’re down to The Final Four(!) and the divisions finally meet up to clash it out. As expected it’s all of our number one seeds competing for the title of champion. What wasn’t expected (at least by me) was the fact that voting has actually gotten easier as subsequent rounds ensue. That said, who do you pick now? Kurosawa or Tarantino? Are you going with the master pioneer or the talented “rip-off” artist? Do you vote for the master of suspense and thrills or Billy Wilder and his status as Hollywood’s “Golden” boy? No pick is right and no pick is wrong; you just gotta go with your gut.
And it’s all over in the consolation division and the Queen’s royal touch seems to have paid off for Sir Ridley Scott as he beat out all of the competition, including the likes of Mike Leigh, Wes Craven, Sam Raimi and Joel Schumacher among others, to take home the NIT trophy. So congratulations Mr. Scott – now go make a good movie!
SCHEDULE (begins – ends):
Round 1: 3/9 – 3/13
Round 2: 3/14 – 3/18
Round 3: 3/19 – 3/23
Round 4: 3/24 – 3/27
Round 5: 3/28 – 3/30
Round 6: 3/31 – 4/1
See the FULL BRACKET
See the CONSOLATION BRACKET
The same rules from round one still apply:
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Kurosawa FTW!
If Tarantino beats Kurosawa there is no God
Tarantino is way better than Kurosawa. EASY CHOICE.
Henrik, you make no sense. You constantly go on about American violence and movies that are derivative with little to say, and for as much as I like Tarantino his films are exactly that which you bitch about. His films are self-conscious genre films appealing to geek fetishism, they are entertainment, never aspiring for any of that higher art you talk about. Kurosawa has mor ein common with Bergman than Tarantino… they both have a vested interest in the human condition, while, at the same time, Kurosawa does have straight-up genre films as well.
No fucking contest.
All you’re saying is true, but Kurosawa doesn’t offer any insight, and thus his attempts are boring. His genre films are boring as well.
Tarantino is funny and whimsical. He doesn’t have anything to say, but at least he has the decency to not pretend otherwise (unlike Kurosawa). Most importantly, he makes his movies today, so he competes on different terms than Kurosawa. Within this context, Tarantino is leagues above Kurosawa, since he is so much better than his competitors.
High end Kurosawa genre-films:
Stray Dog
Seven Samurai
Yojimbo
High and Low
High end Kurosawa art-films:
One Wonderful Sunday
Rashomon
The Lower Depths
Red Beard
Dersu Uzala
I’m as big a Tarantino fan as you can possibly find. But if it comes to a choice between him and Kurosawa, there’s no choice at all – though I love them both, Kurosawa stands head and shoulders above Tarantino as the greater filmmaker, hands down. I’m totally with Rot – Kurosawa is in the same league as Bergman, Fellini and the other great, “classical” arthouse directors. Not only are his films *chock full* of insight about people and emotion, but he has presented his ideas in some of the most marvelously crafted, flat-out entertaining films ever made. And even when he tended to get a little too preachy – see Dreams or Rhapsody in August – it could still be said that he was expressing important, intriguing ideas. And even then, he still held up his end in terms of creativity. Dreams, for all of its flaws, is still one hell of a fascinating, gorgeous film!
The Dostoevsky-strain of Kurosawa is what I respond to the most… Stray Dog, Red Beard, The Idiot, The Lower Depths, One Wonderful Sunday, but also Dersu Uzala which has Russian aspects if not Dostoevsky specifically.
His Shakespeare stuff is great as well, particularly Throne of Blood and The Bad Sleep Well, even though, I can see with them there is a certain pacing and tolerance that is required.
I like segments of Dreams but not the whole film.
I voted for a Wilder/Kurosawa championship round. Let’s go Kurosawa!
I voted for a Wilder/Kurosawa championship round. Let’s go Kurosawa!
Rot: you forgot Ikiru! Ikiru is amazing!
I voted for a Wilder/Kurosawa championship round. Let’s go Kurosawa!
Henrik, go watch Kurosawa’s High and Low.
That is all.
I am watching the Criterion 25 film boxset in chronological order and I am at Sanjuro now (which I have seen before). Ikiru is one of his lauded films I just don’t like. I rewatched it as part of this boxset and thought maybe my opinion would change, but it hasn’t. I appreciate it conceptually, I like what decision is made to make meaning in his life, but as a film, doesn’t work.
Kurt, go watch Stray Dog.
That is all.
Wilder / Kurosawa Easy picking today!
That’s funny, Rot – I have similar feelings about Ikiru. I love its concept and certain passages of it, but there are other moments that just don’t work for me, and make me wonder why it is so highly regarded. For me, the whole storyline with the girl momentarily derails the whole thing, and the post-funeral passage goes for far too long.
Ditto rot and Marc on Ikiru: http://www.rowthree.com/2010/03/22/kurosawa-centenary-ikiru/
But Marc, the whole point of her in the film, as I see it, is to drive Watanabe to what becomes his entire existence after he is diagnosed. Without her, there would be nothing of substance to drive him to this new purpose in what remains of his life.
Just read Jandy’s review and while I can see how people may find the wake scene tiresome, I thought it was a great way to show all of the people responsible for the red tape in one room, denouncing Watanabe, then seeing how he truly did make an impact as they drink more and more and see others coming to pay their respects. I have to think there is some further politcial allegory here, but I’m not smart enough to figure out what it is, I just have the sense it is there. Heck I actually found this scene to be pretty darn funny in parts too.
I’m surprised I’m the only one here that loves this film, but maybe I am odd with Kurosawa’s stuff because Ikiru and The Bad Sleep Well are two of my absolute favourites, while I very much dislike Ran and Kagemusha, which most people seem to adore.
Oh, I can definitely recognize her part in making Watanabe realize his new sense of purpose. But I just felt that the sequences when he’s developing his friendship with her are unfocused and flabby. I know they lead somewhere important in the story, but they are too drastic a detour away from the main driving force of the film to get there.
To better illustrate my thoughts, I’ll put forth the portion of the film when Watanabe is partying it up with the down-and-out dude with the hat, which culminates with the song in the bar. I’m totally on board with the film during that part, but afterwards from when Watanabe meets up with the girl onwards, the film seems to halt in its tracks and head in a totally different direction.
In the book that comes with the Criterion set it talks about that Kurosawa wanted to have a story about someone dying but rather than dying at the end of the story as one would expect, he dies nearer the midway point… hitting home the idea that death waits for no man, or no film. Again, I like this idea, and I like aspects of Ikiru, the night out with the drunk is pretty sweet… but I still consider it lesser Kurosawa. The Bad Sleep Well I only first watched like a couple weeks ago. It is a fairly dense film, not the kind of thing I would introduce people to Kurosawa through, but yeah, I agree, it is solid. And insanely relevant, considering the culture of plausible denial that surrounds not only Japanese politics but the world.
Fair enough Marc; I did not really feel that, but I can see your point. I enjoyed the contrast between the two of them and the difficulties he encounters as he tries to relate to this girl who has essentially become his muse.
Agreed Rot, it is indeed a dense film, but with a lot of rewarding depth if you stick with it, plus it has, in my opinion, one of the greatest opening sequences ever!