Rashomon (Review)
Friday, 12th September 2008, 18:42

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Extras
This is where things improve over the original BFI release. We have extras, beginning of course with the necessary theatrical trailer, which here runs to nearly 4 minutes.

I only received the check disc, but there ought to be a booklet in the retail version, a variation of that in the Criterion release, which reprints the two stories by Ryunosuke Akutagawa that the film was based on, In A Grove, and Rashomon, as well as an excerpt of a book about Kurosawa and Toshiro Mifune.

John Boorman on Rashomon lasts 6 minutes, and the veteran director talks about the influence the film had on him and his contemporaries, as well as recounting a meeting with Akira Kurosawa. This looks to be exclusive to the UK release.

Not exclusive is the main featurette, A Testimony as an Image: Rashomon, which comes to 68 minutes in length. This documentary appears to be identical to that on the Region 4 release, featuring the original crew, writer and composer (or rather acquaintance of the composer). We start with an interview with Shinobu Hashimoto, who originally adapted Rashomon and In A Grove, although it was Kurosawa who finished the final script when Hashimoto fell ill. Then members of the original crew, including the assistant directors, the sound department, the lighting assistant and cinematographers reunite to talk about the film and their experiences making it. There are also some separate interviews with people who were involved in the film’s production. It’s an interesting retrospective, especially fifty years and more after the fact.

Conclusion
… And writer’s block strikes. Rashomon is one of those films that are by now critic proof. It’s truly a classic by every measure of the term, and immune to criticism. A glowing review simply means jumping on a rush hour Northern Line tube train of a bandwagon, while a negative review is taken as a reviewer feeding his or her ego. Anything I can say at this point, hastily put to disc, will hardly be anything that hasn’t been said before, by people more qualified, and possessing the time and motivation to craft a tribute a lot less ephemeral and fleeting than an online review. That said, I really enjoyed Rashomon.

There’s something to be said for the shorter film, although they usually crop up earlier in a director’s career, when money is tight, and studio confidence is limited. That’s when a director has to be efficient, concentrate on character and story, keep things tight and personal. The cast of thousands, the epic scale and the cinemascope comes later in a successful director’s career, and just as A Fistful of Dollars is to The Good, The Bad and the Ugly for Leone, or Duel is to War of the Worlds for Spielberg, so Rashomon is to Seven Samurai. This is an enthralling story, elegantly told, with a small cast and just a few locations and sets.


Often imitated, but never bettered, that’s the claim for Rashomon, and it’s immediately apparent why. The multiple flashback, alternate perspective technique has been used countless times over the years, and it has mostly been about unravelling mysteries, or just revelling in the storytelling opportunities the method allows. While the multiple perspective may be new for Rashomon, it’s still efficiently applied, and the mystery certainly invites debate, but it’s not the central point of the film. Rashomon at its heart is a study of human nature, of what drives and compels us. The setting is important, the ruined gate at the edge of the capital is a sign of a society in decline. The 11th Century was the end of the Heian period in Japan, with all the civil strife and criminality that implies. It gives an immediate context to the events of the film, the crime that occurs in the forest.


It’s all about perspective, there is no truth to the matter, and filtered as it is through the accounts of the woodcutter and the priest, the accuracy of the accounts become even more suspect. What becomes clear are the all too human failings of the people involved, it’s about pride, ego, frailty and hypocrisy, and each account of the participants is tailored to show him or her in the better light, even the bandit who has a reputation to uphold, even as he faces execution. It’s easy to judge right and wrong based on just one testimony, but as we learn more, the identity of the victim, perpetrator and instigator become interchangeable. Then there is the twist as we hear the final account, and realise that the film hasn’t been about the crime, it’s been about the characters of the woodcutter, priest, and commoner all along, and it’s how they react to the crime that defines their characters. The commoner is just in it for himself, enjoying a bit of juicy gossip, while the priest stands aloof, lamenting the lack of good in man, but doing little to seek it out. The woodcutter is the more complex character, torn between right and wrong, wanting to do the right thing, but hampered by a sense of self-preservation, and a desire to remain uninvolved. His is the most hypocritical stance, and emblematic of a society in decay.

It’s a bleak vision; a trawl through the more unsavoury aspects of humanity, man’s baser instincts, and while it is a film that you can’t turn away from, it’s not exactly uplifting. But then at the last, Kurosawa throws in one final twist, an element of hope. It’s a reminder that mankind can aspire to better himself, and even at our darkest there is something worth holding on to. The film takes on a wholly different timbre, and all of a sudden the previous 90 minutes have somehow become utterly inspirational and moving.


Rashomon is a film that deserves to be seen. I just don’t think it ought to be like this. If it were down to me, well I would wait until that new print made its DVD and Bluray debut, but if you have to have Rashomon right now, both the Criterion disc and the Australian release have copious though differing extras. The region 1 disc is NTSC quite naturally, while the region 4 disc has a proper film-PAL transfer (just like the old BFI disc). While the Optimum release may finally bring some of those extras to the UK, there’s no excuse for a standards conversion for a film of this significance.

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