Akira Kurosawa’s film Ran (Kurosawa, 1985) was inspired by Shakespeare’s play King Lear. Ran is the last great film made three decades after the prime of his career. Ran when translated means Chaos in English. There is a large amount of chaos created in the Ichimonji clan. Kurosawa made three more films after this one but none came close in neither quality nor sheer size of the picture. Ran was made a time when the destruction of the world through the use of nuclear bombs seemed to be a threatening possibility. The arms race between the United States and the Soviet Union was quickening. At this point Kurosawa was only making a movie every five years. Kurosawa uses Shakespeare’s play but in a samurai version.
Before Ran Kurosawa adapted a movie from another Shakespearean play named Macbeth. The film he used to tell the story of Macbeth is Throne of Blood (Kurosawa, 1957). The film is a Japanese period drama which lasts two hours and forty minutes long. In Kurosawa’s adaptation of King Lear he combines and condenses Shakespeare’s characters. The greatness of Shakespeare can be seen through this film because as great of a filmmaker as Kurosawa was he was still inspired by Shakespeare. Even though Shakespeare has been dead for a very long time, he still affects artistry in the western world. It is also based on the legends of the daimyo Mori Motonari.
This story is a late life masterpiece filled with an interesting look into the troubles of war and the crumbling of one family. It is an excellent example of aging and making bad decisions. It is also about paying for the mistakes one has made in the past. This was very similar to Kurosawa’s situation because his life was crumbling around him. His career as a filmmaker had stalled and his wife had died while shooting the film. His peers in Japan felt he was outdated as a filmmaker and no one wanted to finance his films. He tried to start his own film company with three other directors but the film that was produced flopped at the box office so the film company went bankrupt. This company was an attempt to make a company similar to United Artists in the United States.
The Ichimonji clan was a very powerful clan until it was handed down to the sons by their father. The story is portrayed through the eyes of an old warlord who transfers his kingdoms to his oldest son. The only wish of the warlord is to be an honored guest in each of the castles with titles and privileges. He also wants to take a small staff of people with him as he goes from castle to castle.
The youngest son believes that there will be an issue with this arrangement. The father abandons the youngest son for his rebellion. The oldest son and the second oldest son strip the father of all of his power and his title. A power struggle begins with the two younger sons. As this is going on the old warlord loses his mind. It is as if all of his crimes have come back to haunt him. The problem this film has is that the wife of the oldest son has Lady Macbeth type of characteristics. She is very manipulative and can get what she wants from men which are ultimately, revenge. The film is set up in three different parts; one part is the story of greed, the second is lust of power, and the third is the ultimate revenge. There are a lot of minor battles that destroy the characters literally or emotionally.
Kurosawa first got the idea for Ran in the mid 1970’s when he read a brief story in verse about the sengoku-era warlord Mori Motonari. Motonari had three great strong and courageous sons; Kurosawa then thought about the idea of making them bad. Kurosawa didn’t initially realize the merge but as he was working on different projects and then came back to the pre-planning of this film, he could see connections. Kurosawa has also said that the film Ran is the closest film to a biography of his life. He feels that the patriarch of this family is himself. Ran was the final film of Kurosawa’s third period which ranges from 1965-1985. During this time Kurosawa had trouble getting financial support for his films. Kurosawa says that in Shakespeare’s plays, Shakespeare does not give his characters a past. In this film the patriarch of the family is haunted by his past.
The film Ran was Kurosawa’s last epic film, and it was without a doubt the most expensive. The budget of the film was twelve million dollars, which made it the most expensive film in Japanese history. They had to use 1400 extras which required 1400 uniforms; they also had to import 200 horses from the United States. Kurosawa loved filming in lush and expansive locations; most of Ran was shot near the mountains and plains of Mount Azo which is Japan’s largest active volcano. Kurosawa was granted permission to shoot at two of the country’s most prestigious landmarks, the castles at Kumamoto and Himeji.
He used many long shots were used throughout the film and there were few close-ups. Kurosawa also used jump cuts to move certain scenes along. Most of the characters in Ran are portrayed using acting techniques known to most actors. Two performances in Ran were influenced by Japanese Noh Theater. This can seen through the character Hidetora and the heavy ghost-like makeup used which create a mask-type of look. It also resembles the Noh Theater through the static motion and silence along with abrupt in some cases violent changes in stance. The character of Lade Kaede is also a performance influenced by the Noh Theater through ruthlessness, passion, and single-minded natures.
The four main themes of this film are Chaos, Nihilism, and Warfare. Chaos occurs throughout the film the destruction of the castles, the destruction of the patriarch’s mind, to the destruction of the family, to the destruction of the family empire. Nihilism has to do with hunting and killing for no reason. This starts with the killing of the boar; it is alluded to with the murders committed by the patriarch of the family, and it continues with the desire for more power which leads to more death and destruction. The theme of warfare occurs with the battle of supremacy in the family, the tremendous battle scene in the end of the film. The theme also occurs when they trap the warlord in the castle and smoke him out as he is going crazy.
One of the major strengths of Ran is the reality it creates in the film. The colors used in the film are very strong and pop off the screen. The battle scenes will never be recreated because programs such as the common gateway interface, a program that will replace the people and horses with computer generated people and horses which won’t make it the same effect as it does with real life people. The castle set which gets destroyed costs 1.5 million dollars. A studio would feel spending money like that is a waste to the budget.
In the last sequence where the youngest and son and father have made up and everything seems to be improving, a stray bullet hits the son and the son dies. This leads the father to have a heart attack and the father dies as well. He uses this as symbolic imagery which has strengths in its beauty and power to make a statement about mankind and the craziness of war. A mutual understanding between enemy and friend does not mean the craziness of war won’t affect a person. The initial reaction of the film was good in Japan it grossed 12 million dollars so it broke even. It earned two-three million more dollars in the United States. In its re-release it earned $337,112 dollars. The film did win an academy award for best costume design. The film also won the BAFTA award for Best Foreign Language film.
Work Cited
www.wikipedia.com
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/1520719/akira_kurosawas_culminating_achievment_pg2_pg2.html?cat=38
www.criterion.com/films/754
www.acepilots.com/discussions/ran.htm
