246. Ikiru (To Live) (1952)

Directed By Akira Kurosawa

Synopsis

A man has been working for 30 years in the dullest bureaucratic job in the universe when he discovers that he has stomach cancer, and decides to start living. After trying several ways to regain his youth he dedicates himself to the creating of a park for children and when it is complete he dies singing in the swings during snowfall... sniff.

Review

Kurosawa is definitely more well known for his Samurai films than for anything else but this is a pity indeed as Ikiru is one of the most beautiful and touching pieces of cinema that he ever did.

I don't know where to start reviewing this film, I finished watching it about half an hour ago and its themes and a certain knot in my throat are still with me. It has been said that one of the reasons that Kurosawa films work so well in the west is their focus on the power of the individual. This film is the epitome of that but it is also quite depressing in the way that even if the individual succeeds the mob is too powerful to enact any lasting change.

The acting is wonderful Takashi Shimura is a great actor who is also the most pathetic of Kurosawa's frequent collaborators, he does pathos like no one else and it is very hard not to empathise with this poor man who spent his life living for his child only to find that he is dying and his child only cares about his money and that in those 30 years he has actually not "lived" one single day.

A beautiful, touching and very infuriating film, you want to crash into that wake and slap all the people there, the grovelling public servants, who cannot understand Watanabe's motivations and think he died sad because he had no recognition, while in fact he died the happiest he had ever been in his life. Amazing film.

Final Grade

10/10

Trivia


From Wikipedia:

Director Jim Sheridan is set to lead an American remake of the film, which will take place in New York.

Trailer, I cried again wathcing this, I'm such a girl: