Machiko Kyo. Japanese star Machiko Kyo was seen in several of the most widely admired cinema classics of the 1950s, including Akira Kurosawa’s Rashomon, Kenji Mizoguchi’s Ugetsu, and Teinosuke Kinugasa’s…
Nagisa Oshima: In the Realm of the Senses Iconoclastic Filmmaker dead at 80 Nagisa Oshima, best known as the director of the sexually charged 1976 psychological drama Ai No Corrida…
What is Ran? Akira Kurosawa period epic is not an adaptation of William Shakespeare’s King Lear. Mieko Harada pictured. “Critical cribbing” is a term I coined in regard to the…
Seven Samurai with Toshiro Mifune. ‘Seven Samurai’ analysis: Akira Kurosawa movie gets better after repeated viewings Some films get better after repeated viewings. Akira Kurosawa’s 1954 black-and-white drama Seven Samurai…
Steven Spielberg The Color Purple Oscar snub: Whoopi Goldberg did receive a Best Actress nomination. Steven Spielberg’s Best Direction Oscar nomination for his 1985 film version of Alice Walker’s The…
Clara Bow, known as the “It” Girl, stars in the appropriately titled It. Part III of Moguls & Movie Stars, A History of Hollywood, “The Dream Merchants,” narrated by Christopher…
Watching Akira Kurosawa’s 1948 black-and-white effort Yoidore Tenshi / Drunken Angel is an interesting experience, for he clearly had not mastered the art form, yet. Even so, there is so…
Toshiro Mifune (second from right) in Seven Samurai The Academy had its John Hughes tribute on Sunday. Tonight, Turner Classic Movies is paying tribute to someone who may not be…
Alfred Hitchcock British films: The Lady Vanishes with Dame May Whitty, Margaret Lockwood, and Michael Redgrave. On Nov. 27–28, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (website) will present the…
Rashomon effect revisited: Toshiro Mifune and Machiko Kyo in Akira Kurosawa classic. Akira Kurosawa’s 1950 classic Rashomon, which officially introduced Japanese cinema to the world at large, will be the…
The Bad Sleep Well with Toshiro Mifune. Akira Kurosawa’s 1960 corporate corruption drama stars the filmmaker’s favorite leading man, Toshiro Mifune, who “gets to display the full range of his…
Soviet masterpiece Battleship Potemkin: Alongside Orson Welles’ Citizen Kane, Jean Renoir’s The Rules of the Game, Akira Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai, and Federico Fellini’s 8½, Sergei Eisenstein’s 1925 classic is one…