Okay, the warriors Washizu and Miki ride back from a victorious battle through a magic forest and run into a wispy specter that tells them that Washizu will become king while Miki's son will inherit the kingdom. Coaxed by his wife, Washizu assassinates the king and takes his place. Again coaxed by his wife, he has his friend Miki killed as well. Well, Washizu (Toshiro Mifune) has made a lot of enemies by this time and they gang up on him, attack his castle, and kill him -- whereupon Miki's son takes the throne, thus fulfilling the prophecy.
That's it, in brief. Can I skip the rest of the plot? Read Shakespeare's MacBeth for the whole story. It's one of my favorite plays by WS, partly because it's the shortest that he ever wrote.
I was led to believe Kurosawa's version of the tale deviated considerably from Shakespeare's and that it might be almost unrecognizable, but that's not the case at all. It's far from a filmed play, of course. In the play we only hear about the woods creeping up on the castle. Here we see the Spider Web Forest in full creepy motion. And if MacBeth is finally killed off stage by Duncan, here Washizu winds up with more arrows sticking out of him than a porcupine has quills. And of course Shakespeare's poetry is missing. Or, let's say, whereas Shakespeare's poetry was verbal, Kurosawa's is visual.
And what a visual delight it is too, in inexpensive black and white, full frame. A terrific use of fog, lighting, spare sets, minimalistic acting punctuated by outrageous ham. Toshiro Mifune overacts to the extent that, at certain points, it becomes a miracle that his eyeballs stay in their sockets.
There are, however, some differences. I think the editing might be off, or else I missed the part where Washizu gives the order for Miki to be killed. (They bring Washizu Miki's lopped off head, missing in the play.) If I remember, Madam MacBeth doesn't become pregnant and have a stillborn child either, as Washizu's wife does here. Also, in the play, she dies for reasons unexplained. Here, she seems to just disappear from the story, like the Fool in King Lear, unless I looked away from the screen at the wrong moment and missed some subtitles. (Just listening to it is no help because I only understand a few words of Japanese and all of them are unprintable.) "Is this a dagger that I see before me?" is missing, naturally, but the Banquo's Ghost scene is kept just about intact. It includes the intrusion of Washizu's wife, trying to explain to the guests that her husband sometimes has these fits and spells when he's liquored up. (How many ordinary wives have made the same apologies for their ordinary husbands?) But Washizu's wife does more than try to patch over her husband's gaffes. In the play, she merely propped up her husband when his ambition weakened, urged him to "screw your courage to the sticking place." In Kurosawa's film, she's the INSTIGATOR of the whole thing. She's truly Machiavellian. Next to her, Washizu is a guileless moron who takes too much for granted and is too dumb to concoct her kinds of intrigues. Her emoting throughout is highly stylized and seems somehow artificial to Western eyes, but probably more accessible to those Japanese who are in the noh.
I admit I found myself a little confused now and then. Especially during the first half, I couldn't keep the Lord's Castle, the Garrison, and the First, Second, and Third Fortresses straight. The play dealt mostly with titles -- the Glames or the Glans or whatever they were -- but in the film, the prizes are places as well as titles.
It's a dark film, darker than the play that begat it. The three witches with their bubbling cauldron seem to be figures of fun, but the spectral old man who sings a tale of life is positively depressing, though spookier than the witches. The imagery in this scene is really notable.
I keep hearing that Kurosawa was influenced by John Ford but it's hard to see how. Kurosawa was attracted to umberous, humorless stories. Ford rarely went without a dance or celebration of some sort. And Kurosawa tried suicide, whereas Ford was never in any such danger except for maybe drinking himself to death. I wonder if it had anything to do with Kurosawa's having fought on the losing side of a war and Ford's having been on the winning side.
In any case, don't miss this.
That's it, in brief. Can I skip the rest of the plot? Read Shakespeare's MacBeth for the whole story. It's one of my favorite plays by WS, partly because it's the shortest that he ever wrote.
I was led to believe Kurosawa's version of the tale deviated considerably from Shakespeare's and that it might be almost unrecognizable, but that's not the case at all. It's far from a filmed play, of course. In the play we only hear about the woods creeping up on the castle. Here we see the Spider Web Forest in full creepy motion. And if MacBeth is finally killed off stage by Duncan, here Washizu winds up with more arrows sticking out of him than a porcupine has quills. And of course Shakespeare's poetry is missing. Or, let's say, whereas Shakespeare's poetry was verbal, Kurosawa's is visual.
And what a visual delight it is too, in inexpensive black and white, full frame. A terrific use of fog, lighting, spare sets, minimalistic acting punctuated by outrageous ham. Toshiro Mifune overacts to the extent that, at certain points, it becomes a miracle that his eyeballs stay in their sockets.
There are, however, some differences. I think the editing might be off, or else I missed the part where Washizu gives the order for Miki to be killed. (They bring Washizu Miki's lopped off head, missing in the play.) If I remember, Madam MacBeth doesn't become pregnant and have a stillborn child either, as Washizu's wife does here. Also, in the play, she dies for reasons unexplained. Here, she seems to just disappear from the story, like the Fool in King Lear, unless I looked away from the screen at the wrong moment and missed some subtitles. (Just listening to it is no help because I only understand a few words of Japanese and all of them are unprintable.) "Is this a dagger that I see before me?" is missing, naturally, but the Banquo's Ghost scene is kept just about intact. It includes the intrusion of Washizu's wife, trying to explain to the guests that her husband sometimes has these fits and spells when he's liquored up. (How many ordinary wives have made the same apologies for their ordinary husbands?) But Washizu's wife does more than try to patch over her husband's gaffes. In the play, she merely propped up her husband when his ambition weakened, urged him to "screw your courage to the sticking place." In Kurosawa's film, she's the INSTIGATOR of the whole thing. She's truly Machiavellian. Next to her, Washizu is a guileless moron who takes too much for granted and is too dumb to concoct her kinds of intrigues. Her emoting throughout is highly stylized and seems somehow artificial to Western eyes, but probably more accessible to those Japanese who are in the noh.
I admit I found myself a little confused now and then. Especially during the first half, I couldn't keep the Lord's Castle, the Garrison, and the First, Second, and Third Fortresses straight. The play dealt mostly with titles -- the Glames or the Glans or whatever they were -- but in the film, the prizes are places as well as titles.
It's a dark film, darker than the play that begat it. The three witches with their bubbling cauldron seem to be figures of fun, but the spectral old man who sings a tale of life is positively depressing, though spookier than the witches. The imagery in this scene is really notable.
I keep hearing that Kurosawa was influenced by John Ford but it's hard to see how. Kurosawa was attracted to umberous, humorless stories. Ford rarely went without a dance or celebration of some sort. And Kurosawa tried suicide, whereas Ford was never in any such danger except for maybe drinking himself to death. I wonder if it had anything to do with Kurosawa's having fought on the losing side of a war and Ford's having been on the winning side.
In any case, don't miss this.