Movie Masterclass

Austin tweeted this last night as he was filming late night scenes for OTH.

Just watched Rashomon for the second time. Kurosawa is the master. Toshiro Mifune is my hero!! - AUS10

Kurosawa is the master indeed and one of the greatest directors in the history of film, his work has not only influenced some of the greatest directors, but influenced filmmaking in general.

If you are a fan of Star Wars - thank Kurosawa. It was Kurosawa's movie 'The Hidden Fortress' that inspired the young George Lucas create a galaxy far, far away.


Kurosawa most famous film is Seven Samurai. The story of a besieged group of villagers who hire seven strongmen to protect them from a bunch of bad guys. Does it sound familiar? It might remind you of the movie The Magnificent Seven which Hollywood took Kurosawa's story and created it as a Western. Or maybe you saw A Bug's Life. This time, the peasants were ants, the thugs, grasshoppers, and the protectors, a bunch of traveling circus bugs.

Or how about Clint Eastwood in A Fist Full of Dollars? That would be Kurosawa 1961 masterpiece 'Yojimbo'. And the master introduced something that is taken for granted now; he creating a new cinematic character type - the antihero. The story is about a nameless samurai pitting the two warring clans of a small town against each other. It was so profound to Italian director Sergio Leone. His movie, A Fistful of Dollars, was at times almost a shot-for-shot steal as Clint Eastwood's nameless gunslinger went through the same misadventures as Kurosawa's nameless samurai.

Kurosawa has influenced everyone from Spielberg to Coppola.

No doubt the Austin was watching it for the story, but he also may have been looking at some of the innovative cinematography as well.


It was in Rashomon it was the first time that a hand held camera was used. It is often given credit for the first time a camera was pointed directly at the sun. In the shots of the actors, Kurosawa wanted to use natural light, but it was too weak. They solved the problem by using a full mirror to reflect the natural light back at the actors. The result is to make the strong sunlight look as though it has traveled through the branches, hitting the actors. After rain would not show up on screen made from pure water, the rain tank tinted with black ink so the water would show up on camera.

The cinematographer, Kazuo Miyagawa, contributed an enormous amount of ideas to Rashomon,in addition to using mirrors to create natural light. For example, in one sequence, he chose to use a series of single close-ups of the bandit, then the wife, and then the husband, which then repeats to emphasize the triangular relationship between them.



Austin once again shows what a cinephile he is, and maybe some day we will see how Rashomon and other movies have influence him from behind the camera.

Happy Austin Friday.

Just a couple more pictures from last nights premiere of LaOD. Check out the rest of the premiere and the after party pictures at IHJ.