10/10, actually better than Avatar
A Kurosawa film better than a computer generated cartoon? :stirner-shocked:
This seems incredibly reductive lol
The visuals are dope, nothing wrong with it being an animation. the story is just beyond lame and boring
Heh, it was said in jest and truth be told I do find the Avatar movies to be visually stunning. But I seriously doubt they will stand the test of time like Kurosawa's masterpieces. The first one is already starting to look dated like so many CGI movies do after a decade.
You know, I actually suspect the first one would still look amazing in theatres
I saw clips of the second one on YouTube and it looks terrible compared to when I saw in theatres
I think it had a pretty good story given that it was a weekly cartoon aimed at children. Kids struggle a bit with complex plots
hang on I might be confusing my avatar franchises
I’m going to say something of which I am not sure if it’s controversial, but Avatar is a decent film but not a good film or, god forbid, a masterpiece. And it this point, I don’t know if the hype around Avatar on this site is a bit or unironic.
I feel like writing
actually better than Avatar
About one of the greatest movies of all time is intended to be a joke.
It's a bit, the Chapos did an ep where they just talked about how great it was and ever since then the community has been pro-Avatar as a meme
Ah shit I thought it was actually gonna be good, havent been able to go to a movie theater
It is actually good. It's not going to blow your mind or anything but the plot is serviceable, the dialogue is good, and the vfx are gorgeous. It's got Sigourney Weaver and Michelle Rodriquez being cool. Worst case scenario treat it as a nature documentary about a cool alien world that also has some shooting.
It's completely fine. If you're expecting a serviceable action movie with tight direction and decent themes, you're going to have a good time. If you're expecting a cinematic masterpiece like Seven Samurai you're going to be very disappointed.
It's a visual spectacle wrapped around a medium-quality action-adventure movie. It's not bad, and it does do the CGI extravaganza better than other movies that tried it - it's certainly better than Marvel slop on all counts. But I still found it largely forgettable.
I mean the Chapos do sincerely like the movie. The Avatar 2 episode of the podcast was quite a nice discussion
A God-tier film, no doubt. I don't remember if it's stated or just implied but the bandits in it are literally just Samurai fail children rampaging around the countryside because there's no war to fight.
Years ago a friend and I saw Throne of Blood in a theater and he said it fucked him up for weeks, a story about a dude whose ambition destroys himself and everyone around him. That friend is now a crypto startup CEO.
Kurosawa was a fascist but also a great artist. IMO Hidden Fortress is his most fun, most rewatchable movie, the one Star Wars was based on.
Edit: I am wrong.
This is a bizarre take. Kurosawa was certainly no communist, yes, but he was not a fascist in any sense of the word. He made a film with the Soviet Union for Christ's sake! The Bad Sleep Well is a movie about the backroom squabbles of high flying CEOs and how the wealthy can get away with everything. Ikiru is about the soulless monotony of work under capitalism and modern Japan that can only be fixed by seeking out meaning through helping others. Red Beard is about the social ills of 19th century Japan and a selfish man realizing that other people have real lives that are worth caring about and caring for. High and Low is about how social deprivation and inequality can lead to societal disharmony and murder, as well as about how the rich don't give a fuck about their hired "help." The explicit plot of Seven Samurai is about a bunch of samurai who reject the strong preying on the weak and instead teach a town how to defend themselves from those that prey on them, showing that anybody can learn the ways of the samurai, even peasants. His films are existential and humanist and to see fascism in something like Seven Samurai is a confusing misuse of the term entirely.
No worries comrade! I don't think you're entirely wrong anyway since Kurosawa did make films during WWII for the Japanese government and definitely didn't make films that directly examine Japan's wartime atrocities like some other Japanese filmmakers, so there's some reaction in him yet. Definitely not a fascist though.
Throne of Blood is an amazing movie! It's actually an adaptation of Macbeth.
fun facts!
Climate and weather are massive themes and devices in Kurosawa films. for Throne of Blood he wanted a steady supply of fog. His solution was to demand that rather have smoke machines in a studio, he would have a replica castle built on Mt Fuji, as fog is common at certain elevations.
Towards the end of the movie Toshiro Mifune's character is threatened by a team of archers. Rather than using film tricks like arrows being sent via wire and sped up in post, he commissioned Japan's Olympic archery team to simply shoot around the actor! This is the reason why the character flails his arms in front of him before moving in a new direction, to telegraph to the archers that his position is changing and not to shoot where he would be going!
I love Throne of Blood!
Never heard anyone discuss Kurasawa's politics before. That sucks.
I don’t know if he ever explicitly called himself a fascist but his movies are all about samurai rescuing peasants who are too weak, stupid, and worthless to care for themselves. It’s cape shit / cowboys in medieval Japan. Ikiru is a little different though and worth a look.
his movies are all about samurai rescuing peasants who are too weak, stupid, and worthless to care for themselves
I see that you haven't watched very many Kurosawa films.
The guy was certainly influenced by fascism and its aesthetics (he grew up during its rise and got his first real directorial work during WW2), but I don't think he or his films are fascist.
Chamabara movies are about Samurai by default. In the highly class stratified and violent world of medieval Japan peasants had very little agency. That said;
7 Samurai is a meditation on how badly the military and militarism of Japan failed the common people. The Samurai explicitly acknowledge that their class are predators who cause harm to the peasants and farmers, and that the peasants are justified in killing samurai to protect themselves. Kikuchiyo is a peasant masquerading as a Samurai who launches in a an emotional indictment of the Samurai class, telling his own painful story and saying that every vice the peasants have comes not from them, but from the oppression of the Samurai. And the Samurai react to this with deep, deep shame, recognizing the truth of his words.
Ran is just Macbeth
Rashomon is a mind bending mystery movie that provided one of the best examples of "unreliable narrator" in cinema
The Hidden Fortress is the movie Star Wars cribbed it's entire plot off of.
You should check out some of Masaki Kobayashi's work, specifically The Human Condition
If you want more whipping Samurai movies, two excellent choices are Yojimbo and Harikiri.
Yojimbo is about a rogue Samurai who passes through a small village riven by the conflict between two gang families. He decides to play each off the other, in true anti hero fashion.
Harikiri is about an old Samurai, years after Japan started its path of modernization, which has left him without a master or income. He travels to a remaining feudal lord to finally die with honor by publicly committing suicide, except there are mysterious continual delays to the process. He insists on telling the Lord, once a rival to his own master, his tale as he waits to kill himself.
Harikiri is about an old Samurai, years after Japan started its path of modernization, which has left him without a master or income. He travels to a remaining feudal lord to finally die with honor by publicly committing suicide, except there are mysterious continual delays to the process. He insists on telling the Lord, once a rival to his own master, his tale as he waits to kill himself.
Is that the remake by Takashi Miike? The original I've seen is somewhat different from that. It takes place in the early Tokugawa era.
Harikiri is about an old Samurai, years after Japan started its path of modernization, which has left him without a master or income. He travels to a remaining feudal lord to finally die with honor by publicly committing suicide, except there are mysterious continual delays to the process. He insists on telling the Lord, once a rival to his own master, his tale as he waits to kill himself.
I was wondering how you were going to talk about the movie without spoiling anything and I'm very impressed.
First 1/3 of harakiri is actually the best movie ever then it becomes the next 2/3... love yojimbo. Kurosawa made bank off that one Clint Eastwood trilogy cus they just stole the entire movie
I really enjoyed the part of the Akira movie where they did the cool motorcycle slide.
I have nothing to add to this conversation. I'll go watch the archived version of the film.
Great movie, but I saw it years ago, should watch it again soon.
I liked it too, I watched it on a tiny 12 or 14 inch crtv on a rented vhs from the library when I was in high school. Horrible way to watch it but I still sat through all 3 hours and was totally engaged.
I liked that the samurai acknowledge that in the end they (the samurai) didn't win either, bunch of em died and they didn't really have anything to show for it.
This is one of the best movies I have seen, but I needed three tries and reading up on it a bit to grasp it.
I had an old crappy looking torrent of this movie (like probably xvid encoded .avi format) but i now have a much better looking "remastered" copy. still haven't committed to watching it.
