Nationalist: Akira Kurosawa - Essay Example

Akira Kurosawa as a nationalist When we encounter the word “feudalism”, instantly our mind generates a dark blurry picture of poor peasants, deeply suffering at the hands of the lords, torture and humiliation, dependency upon the superior class and so on. These blurry pictures have been transformed and recreated into a more vivid and sequential form by Akira Kurosawa, a well reputed and famous Japanese film director. Akira Kurosawa is regarded as one of the most influential Japanese film directors of all times. His 57 years of film production have proved his capability for perfection at a national level. He has also achieved recognition for his movies at an international level. Starting from the bottom in the film industry and moving his way up shows that Akira kurosawa was a hard working and dedicated film producer and that there is no doubt that his films prove his dedication. Taking a deeper look into films he produced, it can be noted that most of his films depicted the pre-industrial era of Japan. In this time span, Japan was heavily engaged in feudalism and samurais had their glory to the utmost level. Further in his career, his movies were based on the Japanese war time and were mostly nationalistic themes. It can be clearly seen that Akira Kurosawa was deeply influenced by the Japanese culture and has been criticized by many as a nationalist. Akira Kurosawa himself descended from a line of former samurais. Samurais are considered powerful and superior to other classes in Japan. Though this concept faded a long time ago, Akira had his pride based on this, it depicted in his personality, values and beliefs. No matter what, human nature cannot amend inherited glory of class heritage. Akira made movies that have inspired entertained and delighted audiences around the globe. But one movie proved to be a turning point for him. “The Seven samurai” a film that became one of his greatest classics, and a film that gained him worldwide reputation. This historical period film sheds light on the 16th century in Japan. The plot of this movie revolves around seven samurais who are hired by a group of villagers who need there protection. These villagers often become victim to the looting and torture of bandits, therefore the villagers ask the samurais to defend and protect them against these bandits. This movie embraces the values of a bygone era and portrays there distinctive values. It was a time in Japan when most of the lords were killed and samurais were jobless, looking for a direction in life, the movie shows how this group of seven samurai comes together for a common cause to protect the villagers upon request and how they are all versatile and dynamic in personality. The movie from beginning to end shows that samurai are superior to others and have always assisted to the weak. It is also clear from the movies plot that the villagers are considered to be weak; they always have been weak and will always remain weak. Therefore a guardian is absolutely necessary who will come to their rescue. It shows that the villagers or the weak have no one else to look upon, no other superior exists who would help them, as if samurai is the only option they have. This scarcity or lack of options obviously will increase the importance of samurai. The samurai will achieve the recognition of a hero. A sign that feudal wars have created lawlessness and decentralization. Akira’s personality and his works of art in the movie business walk side by side. It doesn’t take much of an effort of reasoning ability to show that akira was a conservative and a nationalist, his movies show his vision of contemporary Japan and conservatism where he imagines a world where heroic samurais assist the weak. The movie “seven samurai” shows that it purely essential for a superior hand to exist that will help those in need, and the same hand must exist to punish evil too. Note here that it does not refer to government or laws, In fact it is nowhere near to government or equality, it actually means that any hand with class superiority is the hand that controls. The same hand that feeds the dog may also be the same hand that kills the dog. Without a doubt the dog is the weakest subject here then! Emotions and feelings are also present in various scenes of the movies for example, one of the samurai falls in love with a peasant’s girl, but the samurai knows that it will not have a fortunate ending. Akira instead overshadowed these emotional parts of the movie by the fierce battles and strategy planning on how the samurai will fight the bandits. Once again the movie reared towards the outdated and baseless theme of 16th century feudalism in Japan and that the feudal values must be accepted and class system must exist. It had to be accepted or else the consequences were bad for anyone who opposed to it. Samurai had always been known to assist or accompany the nobility of that time, they had there pride and respect linked to the nobles for whom they worked for, certainly this created a sense of dignity and gratification among the samurai class. Inevitably this pride is passed down to generations of samurai. Akira after all is a descended from there line. Think about it, why is so much emphasis given on samurai? Why is there more focus on the weak vs. strong? Never had he stated himself that his social class was superior to others, but definitely did he prove it this movie! Akira kept the scenes as close to reality as possible, the violence, the costumes, the exquisite details, the weather, the landscapes, literally everything was up to the satisfaction level of Akira. We can also see why and how Akira is claimed to be a nationalist, without judging from his movies. Taking another approach, we can look at how he behaved and commanded at the set. According to people who had known him and worked with him, his directing style was very dictatorial and Akira had a no tolerance policy for anyone or anything that did not come up to his expectations. It is obvious that this style of directing did show positive results, as his movies were fine works of art, portraying passion, force, dynamism, speed, beauty and so on. Akira never was said to be a bad person, he was a great artist, and his smartness was he used that art to form and uphold the superiority of his own class heritage. Akira collaborated with western artists very later on in his career, he however did in 1945 made a movie that opposed western boxing as being more superior than Japanese judo. From this movie it was inevitable that Akira considered every aspect of his homeland Japan to be greatest of the greatest, and that not anything or anyone can degrade its culture in any way. Akira’s movie “seven samurai” achieved the award of golden lion at the Venice film festival. It was also nominated for BAFTA awards and Akira was given the lifetime achievement award. Akira made many films based on contemporary Japan such as “dark angel” and “stray dog”, but is was seven samurai that steered his career full speed towards success in the film industry. Akira Kurosava once said, “Everybody, find something you really love. I advise you to look for something that is truly important to you, something that matters and has most significance to you. Once you find it, try to channel all your energy onto it.” www.Sensesofcinema.com www.brightlightsfilm.com http://kirjasto.sci.fi/kuros.htm Read More