Ran (Masterworks Edition)
by Akira Kurosawa
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DVD details
Actor: Akira Terao, Daisuke Ry?, Jinpachi Nezu, Mieko Harada, Tatsuya NakadaiDirector: Akira Kurosawa
Writer: Akira Kurosawa
Producer: Hisao Kurosawa
Producer: Katsumi Furukawa
Producer: Masato Hara
Writer: Hideo Oguni
Writer: Masato Ide
Writer: William Shakespeare
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: Japanese (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono; English (Subtitled)
Format: Anamorphic, Color, Dolby, DVD, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
Picture Format: 1.85:1
Running Time: 162 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2003-04-15
Audience Rating: R (Restricted)
Studio: Fox Lorber
DVD Reviews of Ran (Masterworks Edition)
DVD Review: Color has never been used more effectively in the cinema
Summary: 5 Stars
"Ran" takes its time to engage the audience. Approach this as you would an afternoon in a Greek amphiteatre overlooking the Aegean. Thunderclouds threaten. You may get rained on. But by nightfall, you have lived through an unforgettable experience.
The experience includes a display of color that will haunt your mind forever. It also includes perhaps the most overwhelming film score since Prokofiev's "Alexander Nevsky."
As for Shakespeare, he's probably o.k. with this. Paul Scofield and Peter Brook this is not, but what it is belongs next to their "King Lear" in anybody's collection of great adaptations.
DVD Review: A mixed bag from the master
Summary: 3 Stars
The Bottom Line:
Ran's gorgeous photography and impressive first hour may be just enough to recommend it despite the fact that its King Lear-meets-Japanese-folk-legend plot doesn't really make a whole lot of sense, the closing battle scenes aren't staged very well (men on horses ride toward the enemy, men get shot, men fall off horses, horses are all fine) and the 160-minute running length often feels interminable; know what you're getting into before you watch this dubious classic.
3/4
DVD Review: Great documentary disk, great movie
Summary: 5 Stars
The Criterion collection is terrific for Kurasawa fans. The interviews with him are illuminating and the watercolor narrative derived from his paintings is very interesting. If you don't yet have a copy of Ran, this collection is the one to get. DVD Review: Great film now out of print
Summary: 5 Stars
Great film. Unfortunately, Criterion just announced this title as 'out of print' due to rights issues. Grab one while you can!DVD Review: Great film-but some reservations
Summary: 4 Stars
I believe Kurosawa's Ran is a great film-maybe even a masterpiece; but I also think it makes a lot of demands on those of us who aren't intimately familiar with Japanese culture. Personally, when I started watching Japanese films, it took me a long time to adjust to the manner of speaking. The actors would seem to be shouting or almost screaming at one another at times when the subtitles would seem to be conveying a totally different tone altogether. Ran is no exception, and this is just one of the factors that makes it difficult to form a true estimate of the merits of a film about an alien culture. However, in my opinion, there is no doubt that visually this film is an amazing, artistic spectacle. The version I own is not the Criterion nor the Masterworks, but is probably the first DVD version produced. The tv I watch it on is a ten-year-old 50-inch Toshiba. But I have to tell you that I find the battle scenes breathtaking. The colors are bright and emotion-inducing. I thought the soundtrack was awesome; especially during the battle scenes-the slow, somber, orchestration is like a simultaneous requiem being played for the dying soldiers cut down by arrows and gunfire. The final battle sequence has an intense visual and sonic presentation of apocalypse-the assembled hosts, the waving banners,thunderous pounding of galloping horses, smoke and flames pouring forth from the large castle tower under a dark and menacing sky. All of this may sound like a conventional battle scene, but it seemed to me that Kurosawa succeeded in capturing the nightmarish quality of such a conflict as well as its dramatic spectacle. On a sensual level of sight and sound, I think this film is magnificent. As for the story, it is of course, King Lear, adapted to Japanese culture, and a powerful story it is. The elements of the situation that unfolds and the temperaments of the characters involved produce an extreme range of human emotions: greed, revenge, hate, ambition, loyalty, treachery, pride ,lust. These swirling, roiling urges propel the story along toward an inevitable culmination that seems almost Armageddon-like in its destruction. The final image, far away and isolated, of a lone blinded figure standing on the edge of a cliff under a baleful sky is both symbol and solid evidence of man's folly. In general I thought the acting was very good, but I must raise another point about a possible issue of cultural misunderstanding. At times it seemed to me the actor who portrayed Lord Hidetora, the King Lear counterpart, indulged in overacting bordering on parody. Whenever he was agitated by emotion, he would flail his arms, grimace hideously and scuttle backwards against a wall, boulder , or whatever was at hand. Based on American standards of behavior, these antics seemed grotesquely melodramatic. But perhaps from the Japanese perspective this sort of self-expression is considered natural and expected of someone living the nightmare that befell poor Hidetora. Or, perhaps Kurosawa was injecting some of the stylized traditions of the No plays into his character. All this is only conjecture on my part. I have to assume there was a reason behind it, but I must admit I found it to be jarring at times on what was otherwise a very enjoyable cinema experience.
Description of Ran (Masterworks Edition)
As critic Roger Ebert observed in his original review of Ran, this epic tragedy might have been attempted by a younger director, but only the Japanese master Akira Kurosawa, who made the film at age 75, could bring the requisite experience and maturity to this stunning interpretation of Shakespeare's King Lear. It's a film for the ages--one of the few genuine screen masterpieces--and arguably serves as an artistic summation of the great director's career. In this version of the Shakespeare tragedy, the king is a 16th-century warlord (Tatsuya Nakadai as Lord Hidetora) who decides to retire and divide his kingdom evenly among his three sons. When one son defiantly objects out of loyalty to his father and warns of inevitable sibling rivalry, he is banished and the kingdom is awarded to his compliant siblings. The loyal son's fears are valid: a duplicitous power struggle ensues and the aging warlord witnesses a maelstrom of horrifying death and destruction. Although the film is slow to establish its story, it's clear that Kurosawa, who planned and painstakingly designed the production for 10 years before filming began, was charting a meticulous and tightly formalized dramatic strategy. As familial tensions rise and betrayal sends Lord Hidetora into the throes of escalating madness, Ran (the title is the Japanese character for "chaos" or "rebellion") reaches a fever pitch through epic battles and a fortress assault that is simply one of the most amazing sequences on film. --Jeff ShannonGeneral DVDs
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