Rashomon and YoJimBo

Rashomon a Japanese movie directed by Akira Kurosawa was mainly to show the humanity of people and how the weather could be an element that provokes the viewer’s feelings. In the movie, different people tell their side of a particular incident that had happened, and all of their views differ in many ways. Who is telling the truth? Who actually was there and witness the whole scenario? Who’s point of view and story can actually we believe? Different people look at the same thing differently. People now a days cannot be trusted of what they say, life just have to be viewed in shades of gray, in my view, it is shades of dark grey as I am not an optimistic person by nature. Not only can people not trust others, they sometimes come to a point of time where they cannot trust themselves too. “Man just wants to forget the bad stuff, and believe in the made-up good stuff. It's easier that way.”, “It's human to lie. Most of the time we can't even be honest with ourselves.” and “… men are weak, they lie to deceive themselves.” That is so much for the irony in life.

The visual effect of the movie which is the elements of the world like I have said above does play a big part in this movie. The director began the movie by showing the viewer the hut and it was raining heavily at that time. The rain symbolizes the blurriness on the situation and the uncertainties of life.

There is still one thing that I do not like about the movie, which is when the woman in the movie will suddenly cry and yell and do silly stuffs. I got irritated by that disturbing fact that the woman was either out of her mind or just plainly provoking the two men to fight over her. The close ups done in the movie was done quite good as the viewer could see the exaggerations of the expression of each character’s face.

YoJimBo, another drama action crime movie directed by the same director was equally as good as Rashomon. The movie started by showing Sanjuro Kuwabatake (Toshiro Mifune), the Samurai’s back. The viewer was not able to see his face until a few minutes after the movie started. I find that part interesting because it is a bit different from the way the rest of characters from other movies were introduced into the movie. I do find a few characters movements and expressions a little too exaggerated and I did not really like it.