Re-understanding Kurosawa through Rashomon

　　In 1979, the movie Rashomon by Japanese director Akira Kurosawa was shown in the auditorium of Beijing Film Academy. On the screen, the characters in the jungle bend their knees slightly and "run short", and the light is mottled and flashing. Among the audience, a freshman boy fell in love with the style, dignified color and uncertainty of this image. This student is Zhang Yimou.

　　"As Kurosawa said, movies are also a lifelong learning for all filmmakers. It is a dream, a light in the dark, a fantasy, a comfort and a light. " Forty years later, the scene of watching a movie in the auditorium is still vivid. Let Zhang Yimou talk about Kurosawa again because of a new book "Rashomon of Kurosawa" by Paul Anderle, former head of the East Asian Department of Columbia University, for which Zhang Yimou wrote a preface.

　　Over the years, Akira Kurosawa’s position has been reaffirmed because he is the first Asian director to win a lifetime achievement award in Oscar history: he is both western and Asian. Nowadays, commercial films and art films are gradually divided. Under the current situation of elite art films, Akira Kurosawa has become a rare "movie master" who can break the secondary wall. Many people regard Rashomon as a sign that they are "literary youth".

　　And Kurosawa himself and his film philosophy have more connotations than the symbol of literature and art? If ordinary readers want to know more about this director, is there a deeper way? A few days ago, this book "Rashomon of Kurosawa" jointly published by People’s Literature Publishing House and Jiujiu Scholars may be a supplement to watching movies. In the book, the author, Professor Andrier, carefully and rigorously interprets the themes of "destruction", "rebirth" and "hero" in Kurosawa’s films, leading readers into the most secret spiritual core of Kurosawa’s film system. In the book, the author traces the symbolic memory or trauma in Kurosawa’s life — — The hometown of Tokyo, which was destroyed by the 1923 earthquake and two world wars, and the decisive death of his elder brother restored the profound historical fetters and personal choices behind Kurosawa’s unique aesthetic consciousness. The author believes that these experiences — — The desolate city and the dead brother have jointly shaped the most inner voice in Kurosawa’s films, and these sad elements run through Kurosawa’s film career.

　　Although this book is a study of Japanese movie master by American scholars, it shows readers a palace-like Akira Kurosawa.

　　On the road of "Kurosawa became a master", apart from the support of Japanese culture, Shakespeare and Dostoevsky also contributed; In the process of glory, Oscar’s choice of Akira Kurosawa is actually worth pondering. So, for today’s readers in China, can we get an objective understanding of Kurosawa beyond those praises and shining?

　　A few days ago, Paul Andriel, the author of Rashomon Kurosawa and former head of the East Asian Department of Columbia University, visited China and accepted an exclusive interview with a reporter from Beijing Youth Daily.

　　conversation

　　Tell about Kurosawa’s brother and the movie Rashomon.

　　Beiqing Daily: The Chinese translator of this book mentioned in one of his recommendation articles that your book is structurally based on the film Rashomon. I wonder if you really have such an idea?

　　Paul Andrea: It’s really nice to see my translator like this (laughs). Although I don’t know how conscious I am, I admit that I do have such an idea. Kurosawa kept going back to history to torture himself in his films and autobiography, and I hope this feature can be presented through such a structure. There is a chapter in the book called "Trial", which mainly involves the Tokyo Grand Trial. In Rashomon, the audience is actually in the perspective of witnesses. In this sense, every audience has also experienced a trial. We don’t know the truth, but we are faced with great doubts. This is what Kurosawa wants to convey and what I hope this book can convey. I hope this book can be an introduction. At the end of the book, I listed the "Extended Reading" section, and listed the bibliographies that inspired me to think or helped me understand Kurosawa’s life and work in depth, which may arouse readers’ further reading interest.

　　Beiqing Daily: How did you think of writing Kurosawa’s brother and Rashomon with so much pen and ink?

　　Paul Anderle: There is a very famous composer Toru Takemitsu, who has always regretted not being able to work with Akira Kurosawa on a black-and-white film. He thinks Kurosawa has created many charming villains, and his brother Bingwu is such a person to me. His brother failed to live up to his parents’ expectations and finally committed suicide. Kurosawa was deeply troubled by these things. On the other hand, Bingwu is his literary guide, encouraging him to enter the film world. "Thirty Lang Chun" and "Muddy Angel" all created such a protagonist.

　　As for Rashomon, I think the baby embraced by the woodcutter can be regarded as a harbinger of rebirth, and it can even be said that this is the rebirth of Akira Kurosawa’s dead brother. This child also proves Kurosawa’s determination to face the broken world, and his efforts to regain lost hope and rebuild his cultural confidence. At the end of the film, the woodcutter crashed into the camera, and it was all of us, as if he were moving on.

　　Movies also have a dark side.

　　But he can still give others hope.

　　Beiqing Daily: You mentioned in your book that Akira Kurosawa is a moralist, and that Akira Kurosawa is more like a "positive film" than his brother Bingwu, that is, a kind of person facing the sun. His works contain a kind of hope. What role does morality play in artistic creation for you? Does a film work exist without moral factors?

　　Paul Anderle: In the book, I mentioned that Akira Kurosawa is a "sentimental and moralist", and these two words should appear at the same time. He realized that he should be a responsible film creator, not only to show good deeds in movies, but to really describe the human situation, which means that movies like Rashomon and Desire of Life are not only "moral" to a great extent. In fact, in his later works, he began to get closer to the situation theory: we are all victims in a certain environment, no matter how hard we try, we can’t solve the problem, and things have become destiny takes a hand. Of course, movies don’t have to be moral, and Yasujirō Ozu’s movies are not. Even Akira Kurosawa’s own movies have a dark side, and he himself has had moments of despair and suicide, but his greatness lies in that he can still give hope to others.

　　Beiqing Daily: You mentioned a point in your book that Ozu and Mizoguchi adapted to color media earlier, but they were more conservative in culture. Kurosawa has shot a lot of dramas of the times, including the most famous Seven Samurai and Rashomon, and most of them are black and white movies. Does he also have a conservative side?

　　Paul Andriel: When you compare Kurosawa’s time dramas, such as Rashomon, with other people’s time dramas, such as Kenji Mizoguchi’s Dr. Shanjiao, you will find that although his films originated from ancient Japanese stories and legends, they are usually modern novels rewritten by Japanese writers at that time. Kurosawa gave up Abdominal Incision because he felt that he was not familiar with the life of the samurai at that time. From these angles, he deliberately chose many texts with unreliable historical basis to express the story of modern Japan.

　　Borrow culture from all over the world

　　Works are popular because they are more Japanese.

　　Beiqing Daily: Many of Kurosawa’s works are adaptations of Shakespeare’s and Dostoevsky’s works. Does this mean that Kurosawa simplified and westernized his own culture and became popular?

　　Paul Andriel: I don’t think so. Some critics really think that Akira Kurosawa can’t represent Japanese culture, but when we go back to Japan in the 1930s, we will find that different cultures and thoughts are infiltrating into Japanese society. The Japanese have been "borrowing" culture from all over the world, especially China. For this whole generation, what matters is not what is resisted, but what is introduced. Ozu and Mizoguchi are popular partly because they "look" more Japanese and even have the words of "Orientalism".

　　Beiqing Daily: In the book, you mentioned that Rashomon won the Venice Film Festival award not because of its "exotic flavor", but as far as we know, most of the early Japanese films that were sent abroad and won awards were time dramas with some kind of "exotic flavor", and it was difficult for Ozu and Chengse’s urban family themes to get such an opportunity. Is there an inevitable cultural curiosity of the West towards the East?

　　Paul Anderle: Both Hell’s Gate and Rain Moon Story entered the international vision after Rashomon. By the time Hell’s Gate won the Palme d ‘Or, there is no doubt that it has formed an orientalist perspective. The story of Rain and Moon may be more complicated. But when Rashomon appeared, the Japanese just thought Akira Kurosawa was crazy. Rashomon won in Venice because of its beauty and quality, which attracted a large number of filmmakers such as Ferini.

　　Text/reporter Zhang Zhiyi (the secretary of the special author Yuan Shou also contributed to this article)