Ran

Akira Kurosawa, 160m, 1985

Hidetora, a feudal lord who controls three castles, in his senescence, cedes his castles, Lear like, to his three sons. Two of them prove disloyal, and he is driven to a point, where ie has no option but ritual suicide, which also he fails to perform because of lack of the proper instrument. Crazed, he wanders into a storm with his faithful fool, to be reconciled with his Cordelia like third son, but the gods that be, in their perversion, allow them but a momentary reconciliation before the beloved third son is felled by an arrow.

The problem is that one keeps reading Lear into the movie, whereas it would perhaps be best enjoyed if you don't know the Shakespeare play. This is a film of great visual splendor. We have armies clashing, horses neighing, castles burning, concubines in mutual suicide, and vistas of Japan's traditional architecture and mountainous terrain, all in the glare of bright sunshine (or the light cast by houses on fire) and the blue dome of the sky. Kurosawa is a master of battlefield choreography and the pennants of the rival armies as they flutter (Japan seems to e a windy place) give the battles a ceremonial and carnival liveliness. Particularly poetic is the repeated symbolism of cloud formations in changing moods, which mark the dramatic turning points. Light is one thing the movie is not short of.

The most impressive acting performance, and perhaps the films high point, is Mieko Harada as the demoniacal Lady Sue. Her controlled yet explosive performance embodies her deep and single minded hunger for revenge for the destruction of her own clan and family. Hidetora's transformation into insanity is well depicted by his incomprehension as the world he has constructed over a lifetime goes up in a tower of flames.

The film is a shrine which had to be visited, and it does add something to the pantheon of Lear depictions, but the drama still remains something of a mystery. I have the Soviet and Ian McLellan's versions on queue, and if the gods allow, there is always the wine of the play itself to savor again.

Before the devil knows you're dead

Sidney Lumet, 2007, 115m

This is a drama of a crime veering tragicomically off the planned trajectory. It is a film chiselled to perfection which holds you by the seat from end to end. The pieces of the story go back and forth in time and are assembled with wicked ingenuity to grip the viewer with suspense and uncertainty about what is going to come next. The pace never lets up and the film gathers momentum till it explodes to a befitting finale. A gem of film craft and story telling which is worth watching for it's sheer wizardry of execution. The high point is the subdued but mesmeric acting performance of Philip Seymour Hoffman. He completely embodies the seemingly confident yet inwardly crumbling character of Andy Hanson.

It is a film about the depths of desperation which money can drive people to, the terrifying spirals of evil in which they can be caught. It begins with a mother's slaughter and concludes with a gut wrenching act of revenge. The title of this sombre masterpiece derives from a saying, "Spend a half hour in heaven before the devil knows you're dead." Lumet died in his late eighties soon after this film. It is a chilling vision of human fallibility seen from the pinnacle of age, experience and impending death. It almost seems as though the great director had taken a spot on the pulpit and was teaching the rationale of the Christian faith through this tragic modern parable with it's macabre grandeur..

High and Low

Kurosawa, 1963, 143m

The wrong child is kidnapped. As long as businessman Gondo (Toshiro Mifune) thought it was his own, he was all too ready to shell out the enormous thirty million yen ransom demand. But the next moment it becomes clear that it is not his but the chauffeur's son who has been abducted, and now he somersaults and refuses to pay, all the more because his financial situation (a bit complicated to explain) is such that he is likely to be driven roofless if he pays. Through the importunity of the chauffeur, the persuasiveness of his own wife, and his own inner awakening, he finally decides to pay the ransom at the cost of impending ruin. The child is recovered. The movie now turns into a thriller of police investigations.

What makes the movie interesting is the motive. The culprit turns out to be not one of the business rivals, as expected, but a demented unknown person. A poor man, he has a sickening jealousy of the well to do, and with devilish cunning he plans and works out his revenge. Marx was perhaps not mistaken in thinking that the material divide is the most elemental in all societies.

The film is plodding by Kurosawa standards and for the most is a fairly routine detective story, and the suspense is enough to keep you attached to the seat for two and a half hours. The cinematography is a salvaging feature and we see the sights and sounds of the faded world of post war Japan--the harbors, the crowds, the alleys, the undulating terrain and the sea at Yokohama, all captured in a wistful nostalgic black and white. Mifune delivers as always, with his cobra like intensity, a Kinsky without the kinks.

This belongs to the dwindling genre of wholesome, uplifting entertainment.

Infamous

2006, 121m

The best one can say about this film is that it expands the territory covered by the other two. Capote (2005) was more about the writer than the criminals, whereas In Cold Blood (1967) was more or less a straight thriller about the crime and the people involved. This film squeezes out some extra mileage by giving a portrait richer in detail about the fascinating personality of the author, though Toby Jones' portrayal lacks the texture and depth of Hoffman, though more finely etched. The treatment of the criminals' personalities is heavy handed, unnecessarily stretched, and maudlin. Keeping the other two films in mind, much of this is definitely redundant. The 2005 film was sufficient, and the other two seem just for curiosity's sake. The three movies in their totality are informative about how this particular best seller got written, and the pain, effort and sacrifice behind a creative triumph. Capote wrote little after this. Nor did his friend, Harper Lee, write a second novel after the one which got her the Presidential Medal.

Nothing like bloodshed to sustain interest over a span of three films.

In Cold Blood

1967, 134m

This film is based on Truman Capote's docu-novel of the same name. The writing of that novel was worthy of a movie by itself, which materialized as Capote (2005) ( referred in previous post) and Infamous(2006). The present film adds little to Capote, which was a more sophisticated and multidimensional film. I intend, for the sake of completism, to seeing Infamous too, as the unavoidable third part of a trilogy.

The film covers the sensational Clutter murders in 1959, in which an entire well to do family comprising the parents and two teenagers, were killed for robbery. The present film covers most of the grisly details. Predictably, it tries to link the crime with childhood deprivation. The black and white photography and jazzy score creates a sombre melancholy mood. As Capote said, the event was the intersection of two worlds which co-exist, the world of respectable "decent" folk, and the social underbelly where jungle laws prevail.

Robert Blake as Perry and Scott Wilson as Dick give convincing authentic performances. Perry's mind is hunched by his early trauma. He sheds tears even as he slits a throat.Wilson is shifty, jocular, talented in criminality and completely scruple free--a likable conman.

I realized soon into the film that I had already seen it, but then it was like it seeing anew, so thoroughly was it forgotten, and that goes to show it's not memorable, though as well made, riveting and competent  as the state of the art.