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Rashomon

Rashomon

Akira Kurosawa


  • Country: Japan
  • Year: 1950
  • Language: Japanese
  •  
  • Runtime: 90 min.

The film that introduced Japanese cinema to the West, Akira Kurosawa's international breakthrough not only had an historic impact on the structure of cinematic narrative (evident in filmmakers from Resnais to Tarantino) but its title itself has become shorthand for the multiplicity/relativity/unattainability of truth.

Cinematheque

screening times

    • Friday October 8
    • 4:30:00 PM
    • Tiff Bell LightBox 3

Note: indicates Premium Screening.

official description

The film that introduced Japanese cinema to the West, Akira Kurosawa's international breakthrough not only had an historic impact on the structure of cinematic narrative (evident in filmmakers from Resnais to Tarantino) but its title has become shorthand for the multiplicity/relativity/unattainability of truth. Set in twelfth-century Kyoto, the film examines an incident of rape and murder from four different perspectives, none of which, it soon becomes evident, can be fully trusted. Embedding his philosophical reflection on the nature of truth in a veritable symphony of style—replete with flashy editing, distinctly un-Japanese music (including Ravel's Bolero) and a breathlessly moving camera—Kurosawa makes Rashomon a startling tour de force. "The film's greatness is palpable and undeniable. Kurosawa's nonlinear narrative and sensual, kinesthetic style helped to change the face of cinema" (Stephen Prince).

Thanks to May Haduong, Academy Film Archive.

Restored by the Academy Film Archive, the National Film Center of the National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo and Kadokawa Pictures, Inc. Funding provided by Kadokawa Culture Promotion Foundation and The Film Foundation. Print courtesy of the Academy Film Archive.

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