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Out of Focus: Kurosawa’s ‘Ran’ a beautiful take on ‘King Lear’

“Ran” is Japenese director Akira Kurosawa’s 1985 adaptation of the Shakespearean classic “King Lear” set in feudal Japan. The film will screen at The Cinefamily this Sunday. (The Criterion Collection)

By Ian Colvin

May 6, 2014 12:08 a.m.

Blood stains the rolling hills of the Japanese countryside. Arrows fly through the air as warriors in phalanx formations march across the plains. In Akira Kurosawa’s “Ran,” these images are beautified – we see poetry in the bloodshed, poetry in war.

The film will be screening Sunday at The Cinefamily on Fairfax Avenue with lead actor Tatsuya Nakadai in attendance. Nakadai starred in several of Kurosawa’s films, as well as Hiroshi Teshigahara’s brilliant “The Face of Another.”

“Ran” is Kurosawa’s 1985 adaptation of Shakespeare’s “King Lear,” set in feudal Japan during the tumultuous Sengoku period. Nakadai stars as Lord Hidetora Ichimonji, a ruthless and brutal warlord who decides to divide his kingdom among his three sons.

One of his children attempts to warn him that this could lead to problems, but Hidetora reacts by banishing him. Meanwhile, Hidetora’s other two sons plot against their father in order to take over the kingdom entirely and strip him of his title, setting in motion a chain of events that signal the destruction of the empire and Hidetora’s descent into madness.

“Ran” is Kurosawa’s last great film, his final swan song, even though he would direct another three features after it. In fact, it may well be his most aesthetically pleasing – its stunning visuals suggest a sense of beauty despite all of the violence on screen.

For the longest time, I didn’t value Kurosawa. Call it youthful arrogance, but to me he was just another one of those directors people tend to gravitate toward when they first get into film seriously, like Stanley Kubrick or Ingmar Bergman.

In many ways, I still feel this way. He’s the type of filmmaker you find when you’re really young and think, “This guy is really great.” Then one day, you grow out of him; you start to explore a bit more, finding new filmmakers and new ways of seeing things. Certainly, that’s what I did.

Lately, I’ve really re-evaluated a lot of these feelings. I’ve come to appreciate him more, to see his brilliance in films like “Ikiru,” “Drunken Angel,” “High and Low” and, of course, “Ran.”

There is a reason he is considered one of the greatest Japanese filmmakers of all time. His command of the medium is unquestionable, and his ability to pull off some of the most beautiful sequences in all of film history is staggering.

In perhaps the greatest sequence from “Ran,” for example, a visibly disturbed Hidetora, caked in makeup inspired by the masks of Japanese Noh theater, walks out of his former castle as it is engulfed in flames. Surrounded by a Japanese army, smoke clouding the skyline, it’s one of the most powerful images of sheer destruction in film history.

Made during a period in which he was suffering from severe depression – in the 1970s he had even attempted suicide – “Ran” is Kurosawa’s most nihilistic movie. There is almost no sense of optimism, no hope under all of the burning rubble. However, it is also one of his most stunning feats, a glorious masterpiece about insanity and chaos in a Japan of long ago.

What classics films would you like to see receive their time in the limelight? Email Colvin at [email protected].

 

 

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