Throne of Blood

Throne of Blood is perhaps the first film I can ever remember seeing. I’m sure I’d been to the cinema before, and I’m sure I’d seen other films. But getting taken to the Pictureville to see a touring print of Throne of Blood represents my first cinematic memory. And as such I’ve always had affection for the film, largely fuelled by my mother’s excitement at getting to see the film, even though I’d never really watched it after this initial viewing.

As such watching it again recently was an oddly nostalgic moment for a person who really is too young to feel nostalgic for anything.

I’m certainly not an authority on Kurosawa, I’ve seen 4 of his films, and as such I sought to watch his catalogue and did so by buying a box set of 17 films from China. The movie I used to start my sojourn into Kurosawa’s collection? Throne of Blood.

Despite irritations with the disc itself, immaculate picture but with horrible Engrish subtitles, it’s safe to say I was blown away. I’d always been a fan of Macbeth and I have to say that for me Throne of the Blood is the strongest, most striking, cinematic adaptation around.

Kurosawa, knowing that Macbeth was somewhat engrained on the public’s psyche, does very to narrate the story. You have the bare bones of the tale but a lot of detail is left up to the viewer to ascertain. The film instead focuses on Toshire Mifune’s incredible performance as Taketori Washizu (the Macbeth of the piece). Telling the story from his perspective the character is made a lot more sympathetic than any other Macbeth. Noted as an honourable warrior the film does little to display his virtues as a soldier and does more to humanise him. Mifune is simply wonderful in the role, his eyes expressing more than pages of prose ever could. He brings the physicality of his older roles (particularly the Seven Samurai) and combines it with a stoic calm.

The film itself is wonderful to look at, darkness and fog used in truly astounding ways throughout. The framing of many shots is simply stunning, and certain set pieces are wondrously iconic. None more so than the finale which looks to have been done largely with real arrows.

The Boying one, this http://www.dvdaficionado.com/price.html?dvd=79447 . Part of 20 film set which seem to be all kinds of illegal. I'm going to get the BFI Throne of Blood, crapper picture, decent subs. The plan is to find which Kurosawa movies I want decent copies of and which I don't.

Anyways. Engrish stuff included Enemy becoming Predator. Mifune imploring his rebelling troops to not be mean. His baby dying, but getting better, but then dying. Various missed words, and bizarre Chinese names. Like Chow, Chin, Chek and Sam. And the ghost demanding Mifune build a mountain of CROPSES.

I thought they were real. I guess he was scrambling at the Arrows to indicate which way he was going. Yeah, Mifune is incredible in this film. He seemed to tone himself down somewhat after this, he never seemed to rekindle the energy of his early movies and instead just became a stoic and metodical powerhouse.

I just loved how he used the fog. That first shot where the fog breaks to reveal the castle is just incredible. And the times when Lady Washizu goes through a door and is smothered in darkness and then emerges again is quite brilliant.

My favourite shot is just after the feast, when Mifune kills the assassin and rushes back against the wall, the assassin desperately reaching out to him. It is just wonderfully composed.

I also like the changes to the characters. Mifune being killed by his own people works far better than an epic battle with a man not born of a woman.

Yeah I really liked the fog and the fact it's not revealed to be soldiers until the end. Like you said it just really enhanced the dream factor of the whole film.

I also thought the witch was quite brilliantly done, genuinely spooky and unnerving and his/her house was a great piece of set design.

One of my early Christmas presents was a bunch of Criterion DVDs of which I got several Kurosawa flicks. After putting up with the wretched subtitles of my first purchase for so long it was a genuine joy to be able to understand what was going on and marvel at the beautiful picture. What I realised when reading a proper translation is how lyrical the language is, it's a really wonderful script almost to the point where the proper translation was like watching a new film.

Oh yeah, and they're actually quite impressively different. I prefer Linda Hoagland's translation purely because it doesn't degenerate into 16th Century English like Donald Richie's translation does.