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Ikiru



One of the greatest achievements by Akira Kurosawa, Ikiru presents the director at his most compassionate—affirming life through an exploration of death. Takashi Shimura (Rashomon) beautifully portrays Kanji Watanabe, an aging bureaucrat with stomach cancer who is impelled to find meaning in his final days. Presented in a radically conceived two-part structure and shot with a perceptive, humanistic clarity of vision, Ikiru is a multifaceted look at what it means to be alive.

SPECIAL FEATURES

• New 4K digital restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray
• Audio commentary from 2004 by Stephen Prince, author of The Warrior's Camera: The Cinema of Akira Kurosawa
• A Message from Akira Kurosawa (2000), a ninety-minute documentary produced by Kurosawa Productions and featuring interviews with Kurosawa
• Documentary on Ikiru from 2003, created as part of the Toho Masterworks series Akira Kurosawa: It Is Wonderful to Create, and featuring interviews with Kurosawa, script supervisor Teruyo Nogami, writer Hideo Oguni, actor Takashi Shimura, and others
• Trailer
• PLUS: Essays by critic and travel writer Pico Iyer and critic Donald Richie

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I saw this for the first time today - the only Kurosawa I've seen thus far (apart from clips in docos, film class, etc). Quite an effecting film. Being an Ozu fanatic, it took a while getting used to a Japanese movie with camera movement, close-ups, dissolves and wipes, but it was worth it .

Spoiler

My favourite part of the film was Watanabe's "courtship" of the young female co-worker. Those scenes were rather lovely. It's a pity she became such a bitch when she started work at the wind-up bunny factory.

I've had a blind spot for Kurosawa's work for so long, but now looks like a good time to dip further into his catalogue.

Uh, yeah. Wait til you see Seven Samurai and Red Beard, and Throne of Blood, Yojimbo, and Ran for that matter. You have just discovered one of the finest filmmakers of all time, imo his films are superior to Ozu, Mizoguchi, Fukasaku and/or Suzuki.

You should definitely check out "Red Beard" if you're interested in another non-samurai Kurosawa. It's one of my favorites, and I enjoy it much more than "Ikiru" (not to say that I don't like "Ikiru"). Anyway, I'd make that your next Kurosawa film; I know that several other people have commented positively about it over in the "Red Beard" thread.

I have Red Beard on my Amazon wishlist - it's another film I've been meaning to see. I saw Ikiru first, rather than the more well-known "samurai" movies, because I got it cheap when I picked up Tokyo Story from amazon.

So many movies and so little time... #-o

lord_clyde wrote:Uh, yeah. Wait til you see Seven Samurai and Red Beard, and Throne of Blood, Yojimbo, and Ran for that matter. You have just discovered one of the finest filmmakers of all time, imo his films are superior to Ozu, Mizoguchi, Fukasaku and/or Suzuki.

Although, in my opinion, you've hit the zenith with Ikiru. Not that his other films are anything to sneeze at. Except Dreams - I'd sneeze at that one all day long. Don't miss Stray Dog - a "lesser" Kurosawa, in that it's mentioned less often, but a great film in it's own right filled with brilliant acting and a really lively, fresh directing style by Kurosawa.

ditto for Stray Dog. i rented that one. liked it so much i immediately knew i'd buy it. and you're right, the story's alright but it's the performances and the mood Kurosawa is able to muster that takes it to another level.

Watch Stray Dog and High and Low in one day and feel the awe that is non-samurai AK!!

My favorite scene is during the funeral when everyone is sitting around gettng drunk talking smack about him until the neighborhood women come in weeping up a storm and they are shamed into giving him credit.

Ikiru, Red Beard and Throne of Blood are my 3 favorite Kurosawa's.

Ikiru is my favorite Kurosawa as well - just ahead of Seven Samurai. In fact, it is my favorite foreign film.

I just picked up this title. More out of respect than of love. I had seen it before in college (16 mm), as well as on the big screen. It has always left me a bit disappointed.

Scene by scene, shot by shot, the film is brilliantly composed, shot, and edited. The Criterion edition really brought a new admiration for the compositions in depth. But I can't shake the feeling that Kurosawa put too much, thematically speaking, into his film. Or maybe that he just chewed on it too long. Not content with telling Watanabe's story, he takes on the living death that is civil bureaucracy. I know he has to take the time to set up his elaborate coda, but after the scene when he discovers what he must do, the film really starts to drag. I think he could have skillfully telescoped a good bit of the wake (borrowing some time from the night on the town that was definitely over-extended) and re-structured things so that he ended with Kenji on the swing in the snow. Where it is now placed in the film, it just serves as Kurosawa's device to help set up Watanabe's shallow colleagues for their short lived change of heart.

The Seven Samurai is, for me, Kurosawa's masterpiece. I have put off getting it, awaiting Criterion's new transfer.

Panda wrote:..and re-structured things so that he ended with Kenji on the swing in the snow.

I also thought this after seeing the film. I was not terribly impressed or moved by Ikiru (sorry for the blasphemy), but this scene was marvelous. I thought Kurosawa could have either repeated it at the end (leaving the earlier scene intact), or had the earlier scene only referred to in dialogue (the cop to the coworkers at the wake) while saving the slow pan through the playground and falling snow to find our hero swinging in peace as the closing shot. This is how one of my favorite novels ends, and it reduces me to a quivering blob every time:

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Kurt Vonnegut's Sirens of Titan

A little off-topic, but a recent film that reminds me of this missed opportunity is Shall We Dance? (the Japanese original). It had a crushingly emotional climax

Spoiler

the daughter forcing the man to dance with his wife

that felt perfect and gave depth and resonance to the underlying theme of (marital) fidelity and wandering interest. But that scene is followed by a shallow Hollywood ending, that works for the plot but loses the emotion.

But one can't change a work of art, or impose one's desires on it. Unless you're a Hollywood producer, of course.

Loved it. Am I the only one who got a "Brazil" feeling at the beginning of the movie? This quickly turned out to be one of my fave AK movies, but I still havn't seen Ran and a few others, but so far so good...

Information: The running time of chapter 21 is 29:38 - that has to be a CC DVD record!

As I only have the Criterion DVD of Kurosawa's IKIRU and would really like to hear what Alex Cox said about the film in his introduction from the BFI DVD, I wanted to ask if someone here could perhaps summarise what Cox says in the intro or could perhaps make the whole intro available for download. I'd be very grateful.

This, along with Stanley Kubrick's "Dr. Strangelove", is probably my favorite film. It's life-affirming, but it never drips in sentimentality. Takashi Shimura gives a magnificent performance, arguably the finest in his career with Kurosawa. And it manages to be inspiring without becomin excessive or cheesy. It is an extremely sad film, and not quite what you'd expect if you're expecting something along the lines of Frank Capra, but by the end I always feel moved and uplifted. Not to mention that final shot takes your breath away.

Is there a reason why this thread is completely empty with discussion? The result of the great board crash from years back?

This may not be the perfect spot to say that, but Ikiru, as long with Yojimbo, Sanjuro and The Lower Depths have been announced for a French BR by Wild Side for 2011 (no more precise date).

anyone have any clue what the likelihood of a CC Ikiru blu-ray upgrade in the near future would be?

I believe most of the Kurosawas are just waiting in the wings, having had Blu releases in Japan a while back. I imagine that Criterion will be favouring the samurai films for obvious commercial reasons, but Ikiru is probably the biggest title among his present-day melodramas, so I expect it will be bobbing near the top of the re-issue list. The other major factor will be the quality of the available transfer, which somebody who's seen the Japanese release will have to comment on.

zedz wrote:The other major factor will be the quality of the available transfer, which somebody who's seen the Japanese release will have to comment on.

That isn't so much of a major factor if Seven Samurai is anything to go by. The Japanese Blu was abysmal, so Criterion were obviously happy to do their own thing on it. That policy will no doubt extend to other big name Kurosawas.

Yes, but my concern is that, if they can't use the existing transfer and need to arrange for a new one, that will inevitably delay any reissue, or even put if off indefinitely if they're waiting for a proper restoration.

I can't help but feel like they have Ikiru ready to go though. surely it'll be that, Throne of Blood/Hidden Fortress, and wherever after that

I just hope an Ikiru upgrade is paired with a Madadayo spine in the same month.

ryannichols7 wrote:I can't help but feel like they have Ikiru ready to go though. surely it'll be that, Throne of Blood/Hidden Fortress, and wherever after that

I just hope an Ikiru upgrade is paired with a Madadayo spine in the same month.

well that would make my year! I feel like Madadayo and Ikiru are pretty likely candidates as far as the next Kurosawa films to get the CC bluray upgrade. Ikiru because it's probably his most well thought of film not blu-rayed yet, and Madadayo because it just went out of print with ak100 and because there are no late period CC Kurosawa blurays yet.

I imagine a proper restoration would be necessary in any case, because, as I recall, the source print that served as the basis for the Criterion DVD was a bit rough.

jkj1908 wrote:...and Madadayo because it just went out of print with ak100 and because there are no late period CC Kurosawa blurays yet.

Ran and Kagemusha both have blu-ray releases, albiet, the former from Studio Canal.