Simply Perfect

Fresh and Exciting

Absolutely Fantastic

Blistering performances.

A heinous crime and its aftermath are recalled from differing points of view. Rashômon is a japanese drama that instead of making people cry it makes them laugh and get bored and that's unfortunately sums up pretty much most of the movies that i have seen from the Top 250 films of all time so far and it's pretty sad i guess now as far as acting goes? the movie was horrible, as far as story goes? pretty much same level as well and as far as script goes? same track as well and if you love this kind of movies see it but if not? skip it and watch something else..

I'm actually mad with this movie. It's such a great effort in almost everything for such a poor execution in two major areas; the acting and the script. The former is so absurdly over-dramatic that it seems like a parody of itself, has comedy-like reactions without a link between them to feel organic, it's just laughable b-movie type ridiculousness. The latter just doesn't know how to handle the plot, it's a lowsy implementation of everything good with the story.The direction, of course, is magnificent. There's one point when two characters with opposite moral highgrounds naturally set upon a third character to represent his own disbelief with the situation he's in. It's beautiful and it's vivid.

There can be no doubt about the technical skill of legendary director Kurosawa. The structural creativity of the writing is also impressive.The eleventh film directed by Kurosawa (excepting co-directed "Uma" and "Asu o tsukuru hitobito"), Rashômon (1950) is by many critics considered Kurosawa's first masterpiece. While I can see why the theme and structure of the narrative was groundbreaking when the film premiered, I'm sorry to say that, after my first viewing, I was not really caught by the story or the way it was told. What I really appreciate, however, is the great camera-work, the beautiful black-and-white photography (by Kazuo Miyagawa) and the iconic music (composed by Fumio Hayasaka).

Akira Kurosawa's Rashomon for the time would had looked like an experimental film about unreliable narrators and recounting an incident through different viewpoints and flashbacks.In 17th century feudal Japan, some men take shelter from the rain they discuss a murder which took place recently. A notorious bandit (Toshiro Mifune) catches a glimpse of a woman's face (Machiko Kyo) travelling with her wealthy samurai husband (Masayuki Mori) and pursues them both. The husband does battle with him and is killed with his body discovered by the woodcutter.At the bandit's trial, all the witnesses which includes the victim speaking through a medium give different accounts of what actually happened that day, a lot of it is contradictory.The film shot in black and white is far from the historical sagas the director was known for, it is a simple story with a small cast that leaves you flummoxed with the different perspectives regarding the murder. Maybe Kurosawa was making a point about the justice system where people can see the same incident and come to different conclusion as well as indirectly wanting to show themselves in a better light.The film is thought provoking and for Kurosawa a relatively short one but it has aged, with the acting looking a tad overcooked. The film also has a strange soundtrack which is basically Ravel's Bolero.