Can’t it be both?
You have beautiful visuals matched with a great story, strong performances, etc.
I think it’s a well rounded film.
I’m with Ulicain. Wowed me all around.
I am a Kurosawa fan. But didn’t like it :(
I’m a Kurosawa fan, and I saw this for the first time on the big screen. I was preparing for an absolute masterpiece, but was left somewhat underwhelmed.
I think people are in love with the idea of Ran – a grand Shakespearean epic that parallels Kurosawa’s own life. But the pacing in the first hour is unnecessarily slow, and the film can often be dry. I also didn’t think the battle scenes quite worked. I know that Kurosawa was aiming for an unsettling, quiet effect, but the music he chose just didn’t seem to fit. However, the last hour of the film almost redeems the rest, and I will never forget the shot of the blind man stumbling at the edge of the cliff.
Timeless masterpiece, overwhelming in its greatness.
not quite great, but very good.
Charles, isn’t RAN a little cheesy for you?
@Pradipta Mitra Why’s that? :)
I feel pretty good about it, thanks for asking.
Despite the hype of “hugest [or just plain enormous] cast of extras ever” for the battle scenes, I was glad that Kurosawa didn’t just shoot them all in panorama and point out how many there were — there was a purpose to using that many people.
That’s like one tiny detail of an example that for me demonstrates how wisely it (Ran) was directed. Also: the aspect of its ending that didn’t try and resolve all the (eponymous) chaos and was very stark and bleak and mostly unhappy in its portrayal of the same. If that makes no sense, try this: instead of representing his characters’ dilemmas as ones that could be solved or at least framed coherently, Kurosawa masterly portrays the complete breakdown of everything in that world.
Also: the opening scene in the fields (with the sleeping father and all) is my favourite “Classical Cinematography” of like any time period it can be placed in.
Ran, is a audacious movie, in many ways; but beyond that it is a good film, in which nothing is out of place, nothing subpar-not the photography, not the sets nor costumes, not the editing, or the acting.
It is a retelling of King Lear, set in another locale; but never feels like a filmed play-it is completely cinematic.
The film contains a sort of cinematic language that you will not find anywhere outside of Kurosawa’s body of work, and it is the distillation, the final draft of a style that Kurosawa had been shaping during the second on half of his career, for the better part of the previous 25 years. A style in which the camera does move, but rarely. A style that makes use of mostly wide shots with telephoto lenses-flattening out the action on screen which lends a painterly, surreal touch. As a result, it is a film that feels slower than his earlier work; at 160 minutes, it feels slower than the 200 minute Seven Samurai, but Kurosawa the master editor knows just the right time to move along to the next scene and when how long to play out this tale.
Personally, films of this kind, at this speed, are not generally my favorite films; but this film is just so expertly and exquisitely put together that I have no choice but to stand in awe of it. There is an audaciousness, a boldness, that I spoke of earlier that I find very compelling-especially when Kurosawa aims at such heights and actually achieves what he was aiming for. How bold is it? Imagine spending half of the budget on a Castle that you burn down in one take. Imagine remaking King Lear in feudal Japan, and rewriting major pieces of the story and framework-even adding characters, and the film not being an affront to the great Bard; but a complement, from one genius to another.
And Kurosawa does not take working in color for granted, nor does he over do it by splashing garish colors everywhere(he had already worked that out of his system in Dodeskaden and Kagemusha). The film is simply perfect; and a bold artistic vision-even if apocalyptic.
I could probably talk about Ran for longer than its running time; from the actors, to the story and the changes that Kurosawa made, to his use of colors and on and on.
I loved it. I especially loved the battle scene where his entourage of concubines and body guards are totally wiped out no sounds of warfare are heard just that eerie music. One of those movies that just sucked me in. I don’t even remember the subtitles, I got so into it.
@Anthony, I doubt if I could give a “objective” answer, its easier to do that when one likes a movie :)… to take a cue from Jason, I could probably go on about Rashomon or Yojimbo for longer than their running time :D
Ran just didn’t do it for me, it didn’t move me with the same sense of rythm, same fidelity to truth that Kurosawa typically does.
Ran a fun little nihilistic romp, full of pretty fabrics and lovely arterial sprays (one thinks of the fountains of Versailles).
I felt that the Lady Kaede story line was a freely spinning cog, performing no real work — a neoplasm. As much as Lady Kaede is portrayed as the puppet master, the story would have unfolded in the same manner without her manipulations.
Petro, I think the story is about Hidetora and his madness, which is directly related to his children rejecting him, which began with the first son’s rejection, which was instigated by Lady Kaede.
I believe, that she then had the second son assassinate his brother, her husband. She did this all for revenge against Hidetora who had slaughtered her own family.
Well yes, Lady Kaede certainly helped things along. But surely the two sons would have turned against the father, and then on each other, regardless, just as the daughters do in Lear, and just as the third son (the Cordelia figure) was able to predict at the outset. The wheels are set in motion merely by Hidetora’s ceding his power and dividing his kingdom.
But even if I’m right that Kaede is somewhat redundant to the drama, that perhaps is no great fault.
I’m not so sure that they would have, at least not that quickly. The oldest son was a bit of a pushover, and had it not been for Kaede, He basically would have been a puppet to his father as long as his father was alive, merely a figure head of the clan. I don’t think that the second brother would have been strong enough to defeat the older brother and his father at the same time, and so he would never have attempted it. In fact, the father and his bodyguard were dangerous enough that it took the combined forces of the two eldest brothers to try and defeat him with a surprise attack-which is when second brother betrayed the older brother.
Kaede was central to the derailing of the entire clan.
Double post
Roscoe,
Why would I think Ran is cheesy?
@PRADIPTA MITRA
Yeah, good point. I mean: there are tons of “classics” or “masterpieces” out there that are brilliant in worthy-of-filling-libraries kinds of ways but don’t “do it” for me or you or somebody. Going candid is usually the best response.
(I felt that way about Chinatown the first time I saw it and felt So. Ashamed. but then saw some other Polanski and changed my mind. Though that was probably just a lucky circumstance.)
Fair enough, Jason. But the eldest son is a pushover, and Hidetora’s retinue is dangerously large, only because the scriptwriter made them so. They could have been written otherwise, with equal plausibility. Hidetora’s abdication and the division of his lands are inherently an adequate impetus for the tragedy. There seem to me to be two engines driving the plot, where one would suffice.
One of the most beautiful films ever made
and a kick-ass story to back it up
I just watched this for a second time yesterday (on a 31-inch TV as opposed to watching it on a 13-inch TV the first time), and I came away much more impressed this go-around.
I already knew that this movie was visually striking, so when I viewed it this time (on 11/19/2010) I was looking for more story and narrative elements that I could latch onto, perhaps some element I didn’t quite find fulfilling the first go-around that would make much more sense this time, and I definitely found it.
Mid-way through this viewing, I realized that Hidetora is not someone with whom I should really identify with. He’s really quite a despicable man, with his youngest son putting him in his place, and he’s not someone with whom I should feel sympathy. At the same time, he’s not really an object of scorn, which makes his role more symbolic than anything.
To me, Hidetora was a symbol of mankind’s failure, actually double failure. The first failure is to lead to others’ destruction through our actions, and then the second one would be the failure to heed a warning that would prevent us from following through with our own destruction. This idea really brought the story into focus, and I believe I more effectively absorbed the narrative this time around.
After I had this clarifying idea in mind with Hidetora, I still identified (briefly) with Lady Kaede, and certainly with Sue, as well as with Tango the advisor and Saburo, the third son.
With the visual presentation of this film, mainly with the camera’s distance from the main characters throughout, I thought it was definitely an effective device, with the idea of us observing the story from an omnipotent viewpoint, from the viewer not undertaking any direct involvement with the situations or their resolutions. And, like Sidney Lumet said in his extra on the Criterion disc, the blazing color palette (and luxurious costuming) definitely adds to the overwhelming visual effects, and doesn’t provide a “cheating” device for evil and destruction to be represented with a musty, dirty or grimy effect over anything in the film.
Overall, I was more impressed and fulfilled by my second viewing of Ran. This is one of those films that certainly can get you thinking about how you deal with your own life’s situations, whether you are doing things that are benefitting yourself or others or if they’re hurting them, and whether or not you can change your life’s course if you have enough time and enough warning being given.
Very good stuff, definitely.
I’ve never seen the whole thing. I took it out of my school’s library once but the second half of the disc was scratched so I could not finish it. I don’t want to comment without seeing the whole thing. One thing I’ll say is that this is the first time I’ll ask netflix for the DVD instead of the blu ray. Hopefully, they’ll send me the Criterion DVD and not some former sub-par R1 release, unless the CC is the only R1 DVD release of Ran in existence.
On that note, is there any way to tell netflix which release of a film you want, because they sent me the Laserlight version of The Lady Vanishes, and I was quite annoyed but didn’t know of there was a way for me to specify that I want the CC version.
Charlesdegaulle
Great film or eye candy?